(narrator) Titanic struck the iceberg that doomed her at 11:40 P.M. April 14th, 1912.

(telegraph beeping) (somber orchestral music) ♪ Shortly after midnight, Titanic's bandsmen gathered in the first class lounge.

Later, they would move outside to the deck, and for the next two hours, with no regard for their own survival, played music that helped keep passengers calm as the lifeboats were being loaded.

Survivors remember hearing a 1911 popular dance hall song from the White Star Line's Songbook entitled Songe d'Automne.

Schoolteacher Lawrence Beesley was able to board Lifeboat 13 that night and later remembered... (Lawrence) Many brave things were done that night, but none more brave than by those few men playing minute after minute as the ship settled quietly lower and lower in the sea, and the sea rose higher and higher to where they stood.

The music they played serving alike as their own immortal requiem and the right to be recorded on the rolls of undying fame.

♪ (horn blowing) (cheerful music) ♪ (narrator) Four days earlier, with great excitement and anticipation, Titanic, the practically unsinkable ship, sat at her berth in Southampton about to embark on a maiden voyage.

It was April 10th, 1912, the Edwardian era was coming to an end.

It was a time when everything seemed to be going right, a time of leisure, conspicuous wealth, and great class distinction.

(man) The Edwardian era was the very sunset of the old Victoria era of the 19th century where Western civilization was supreme, technology was moving on, was going to make everything better for everybody.

It was also a period of great inequality.

If you were in a position of authority or commerce or government, your ticket was pretty much written for you.

If you were in the middle class, you were comfortable and there were chances to move up, but the immigrants had it the hardest.

Many times, the situation in Europe was untenable and you saw great masses of people trying to get out of the continent hoping for a better life in the United States.

(narrator) In so many ways, the unsinkable ship was truly a monument to its moment in time.

(man) That's what makes Titanic very special.

There certainly is not a shortage of disasters in the world to look at, but people find a very special place for Titanic, and I think it was because of that time.

It was the Gilded Age, a time when there was chivalry, a time when class structures reigned supreme, where if you were third class, you were certainly treated a lot differently than if you were first class.

It was a very special time, and I think Titanic was a microcosm of that society.

(dramatic music) ♪ (narrator) The early 20th century was the golden age of travel.

Ocean liners were the only means of transportation.

The Edwardian era had created a flood of human beings with a need to cross the North Atlantic.

(Bill) Who traveled basically depended upon what class you were in.

If you were traveling first class, there was a good chance you were there for a vacation in Europe.

You might be traveling to Egypt to see the pyramids.

Then, of course, there were those few captains of industry who actually had to go and oversee the operations in Europe personally.

Second class mostly catered to middle class people.

These were people who were affluent, affluent enough to travel, and who wanted to see the continent.

In the case of third class, it was mostly emigrants, it was mostly people from the British Isles and Continental Europe emigrating, traveling to the United States.

(narrator) The increased demand for travel created an intense competition between the steamship companies, particularly the two English companies, Cunard and White Star.

Cunard emphasized speed in their ships.

White Star opted for size and luxury.

(Bill) White Star decided that their ships would be English castles gone to sea.

Very reserved, very decorous, very comfortable, and everything you could possibly want for the four days or so it would take to cross the ocean.

(narrator) Tragically, however, Titanic's impressive luxury and size fell short when it came to lifeboats.

She had lifeboat capacity for only 1,178, far short of the 2,225 passengers and crew that boarded her.

(bright music) ♪ (man) Today we think of ocean liners, really, as cruise ships.

They are a recreational function.

You went on a cruise ship to have a good time.

But in 1912, ships were not cruise ships at all, they were liners.

They were ships that were placed on a line between Point A and Point B, so almost everyone who was on the Titanic was on that ship for a particular reason.

It was a method of transportation, it was the only way to get across the Atlantic Ocean.

If somebody from modern times went back to 1912 and just peeped in on the Titanic, in a lot of ways, they'd be impressed.

The ship's opulence, the total number of servants on board to take care of them.

The flip side of the coin is, remember, this is almost a completely non-technological era.

There's only 50 or so phones on board, there are no televisions, there's no cabaret, there's no theater, there's no ballroom, it was mostly how are you going to amuse yourself?

(narrator) On Titanic, organized entertainment was almost nonexistent.

Passengers, for the most part, created their own amusement.

(Charles) You spent some time, perhaps, out on deck in a deck chair watching the ocean go by.

Two veranda cafes where you could pick up some light refreshments during the day, but for the most part, you were on your own in terms of entertainment.

In second class, they had a library, as did first, so as a result of that, you could spend some time curled up with the latest bestseller.

The ship's orchestra played in both first and second class.

But in third class, in a way, it was actually do-it-yourself entertainment.

They had a lounge, they had a smoking room, they had a bar, but that was really about it.

(narrator) Despite the entertain yourself policy of most ocean liners, there was, in fact, one form of entertainment that all companies provide their guests.

Almost all steamships at the time had a band.

The Titanic's band was really more like a string quartet.

The band was in steward uniforms, they were relatively few in number.

They also tended to perform lighter works, typically in passages, entry foyers, and public spaces.

(upbeat music) ♪ (man) What we call the Titanic band, of course, was actually two bands.

We know there were five playing in the first class lounge, and then there were three playing in a kind of continental style restaurant.

They were kind of all-purpose musicians, so if there was a church service, for example, they would be expected to play, and if there are celebrations, like when ships beat the speed record, they would have a big celebration, the band would play.

(narrator) First and second class passengers on the Titanic were provided a copy of the White Star Line Songbook.

(man) The music in the Titanic Songbook isn't based around concert hall repertory of classical music so much as the types of music that people might listen to in their homes when they're getting together, and one of them might play the piano, others might sit and listen.

The musicians were supposed to know all these 300+ songs that were in the songbook, and the form was that, when they were in the venues, people would have these little books, which they had been issued with, and they would call out a number like 317, and these guys were expected to be able to play it.

And I believe that that is the origin of calling a song a "number," you know, like, "I've got a little number for you."

(narrator) The titles in the songbook presented the passengers with a wide variety of music from operetta to waltz to ragtime to sacred hymns.

You had the safe classics like the William Tell Overture, but you also had crowd-pleasers of the day, like ragtime, Alexander's Ragtime Band, an assortment of Broadway showpieces.

The thing was, you had to be a good musician to be able to go effortlessly from one genre to another.

(playful music) ♪ (Peter) These songs were all very popular, and some of the songs in the Titanic Songbook were only less than a year old.

Some of the Irving Berlin songs in particular are very new, very cutting edge, and yet they would've been known well.

Music was really one of the all-encompassing elements of any ship.

It brought people together, and it didn't matter if you were first, second, or third.

The band might not have played for third class, but we have notes that they had their own musicians there, so music was very important.

It was a method of entertainment that was equal to everyone.

It might have been different music, but they all enjoyed it.

So it's an important part of society, not to mention Titanic as well.

(narrator) As the largest and most lavish vessel on the Seven Seas, the ship nicknamed the Millionaire's Special required a band with the talent to impress a first class full of the Edwardian era's elite.

Yes, in terms of caliber for the musicians, Titanic's had to be very, very good.

Part of the equation is you're dealing with first class passengers who are world travelers, they've been on every ship, and frequently, they're looking for something to comment or criticize as a matter of conversation.

A weak band member would be pointed out, and that weakness would be repeated.

Now, in addition to just pure musicianship, you have to be a special sort of person to actually be a band member on a large ship like Titanic.

You're dealing with passengers, not all of which feel the need to be polite to the serving class, so you're picked for temperament as well.

Strong references from your previous employers were absolutely essential.

(bright music) ♪ (narrator) Sometimes a band is only as strong as its leader.

For Titanic's band, 33-year-old violinist Wallace Hartley seemed the perfect choice as band leader.

He was a musician with extensive experience at sea and on land, a strong leader with a solid moral compass.

Hartley was born and spent most of his formative years in the small town of Colne, England.

He was raised a Methodist, and his faith in God would shape his entire life.

(Steve) I was impressed with Wallace Hartley's personal faith.

I think they all had some sort of faith background, they started off in a church situation or went to a church school.

He comes over as a great leader and kind of very solid, dependable guy, which is why he was chosen for such a prestigious job, but I think the way he responded must have infected the others, because it had to come from the top.

(narrator) It was Hartley's father who set the foundation for the band leader's devotion to God and passion for playing.

Albion Hartley served as a choirmaster and Sunday school superintendent for the Bethel Independent Methodist Chapel.

Young Wallace received his first lesson in music from his father after joining the choir.

(man) A key fact to remember is that Wallace was a very gifted amateur, but an amateur, someone without paper qualifications, which is actually very atypical of the, at the time, leading orchestras and leading choirs in both Lancashire and Yorkshire.

(narrator) Wallace also received additional training in musical theory from another congregation member, Pickles Riley.

But life was about more than music for the budding violinist.

It would appear that swimming was one of his main athletic interests, because we have details, which are published, of him swimming for his school as a little boy from 1894.

(narrator) Wallace's first job as a bank clerk provided an income while he chased his first love: music.

Wallace seized on any opportunity to perform and moved easily between concert halls and less formal venues.

It was a casual performance in a Collinson Café where fate brought him together with the love of his life.

(man) Maria Robinson was the daughter of a mill owner in the North of England, and she met Wallace, they fell in love, they were engaged at the end of 1910, and they were looking to start a new life together.

(narrator) By the time of their engagement, Wallace had already been at sea for nearly two years.

Despite their engagement, it appears he was not ready to give up the adventures and opportunities -the sea provided.

-The sea gave him opportunities, particularly with playing in the first class section.

There, he would have met other musicians, and theater impresarios, managers, and so on to develop, if possible, a more international career.

He did not want to be a member of pit orchestra in the local music hall.

(narrator) Hartley's first taste of life on a liner was a 1909 stint on Cunard's Lucania, a ship that had once held the record for the fastest Atlantic crossing.

Later, Hartley was transferred as second violin in the five-piece band aboard the prestigious Lusitania.

Then, less than two years after his career at sea had begun, Cunard offered Wallace Hartley a promotion.

He was to become the band leader of the Mauretania.

At the time, the Mauretania was the most magnificent ship afloat.

(cheerful music) ♪ On April 8th, 1912, the Mauretania docked in England from New York.

Wallace Hartley reported to the musician's agency and was told once again he was going to be the band leader of the biggest and most luxurious ship that had ever sailed.

He was off to Southampton to join his bandmates on the RMS Titanic.

(Andrew) Hartley was a young man in his early 30s with his life ahead of him.

He was a competent musician, he was a-- he wasn't a professionally taught young man, but he was a good violinist.

We have different accounts there that he was planning to only sail on the maiden voyage and use that as, obviously, a high point in his career, but then another account states that he was planning to leave in approximately two months' time when he was planning to be married to Miss Maria.

(Andrew) He was going to America, he was working to start a new life with his fiancée, the love of his life, Maria Robinson.

And we do know that Titanic would have been one of his last voyages.

(narrator) Wallace Hartley boarded the Titanic two days later on April 10th, 1912.

He was carrying with him a leather valise, and inside the valise was a violin.

It was a very special violin, because it had been given to him by his fiancée, Maria Robinson.

He may have been spending long periods of time away from Maria, but he carried a piece of her wherever he went.

♪ (mellow music) ♪ The bandsmen on the Titanic were divided into two musical groups, a quintet that performed for first and second class passengers in various set locations around the ship, a separate three-piece ensemble that played only in the first class reception area outside the À la Carte Restaurant and Café Parisien.

(Bill) The À la Carte restaurant was designed to be an elite restaurant catering to the upper circles traveling on Titanic.

There were a number of differences that set it apart from the ordinary dining room.

First of all, it was fairly small, second of all, all of the menu items were pay as you go, and that, frankly, was a very expensive arrangement.

There was a cover charge, of course, to get in, but once you did, you found you had total flexibility of the menu.

Anything you wanted could be ordered.

(narrator) The trio never performed inside the restaurant.

Instead, they remain just outside its doors so that their music would be heard only in the background, enhancing the ambiance of the dining experience.

♪ The leader of the trio was violinist Georges Alexandre Krins.

He was born in Paris but moved with his family to the small town of Spa in Belgium.

It was there early in his life that he discovered his talent and love for the violin.

At the young age of 13, he was enrolled at the Conservatoire Royal de Musique in Liège, Belgium where he studied for six years.

He was recognized by his professors as a gifted and hard-working student.

He graduated in 1908 after winning first prize for violin.

Krins then traveled to Paris and performed in pit orchestras for comic operas.

Next stop was London and the newly opened Ritz Hotel.

♪ The bandmates traveled as second class passengers on Titanic with cabin accommodations that had them split into two groups.

The trio had a small unnumbered space on E Deck and the quintet occupied a six berth among the second class cabins.

Both of these cabins were very similar to what you would see in second class-- wooden bunk beds, comfortable accommodations.

The difference was that the larger cabin had six berths to accommodate everybody and an extra.

Something else that was a little unusual was the fact that there was a work table in the middle.

The band would spend time going over the music, possibly transcribing, that needs a workspace, and White Star provided them with basically a picnic bench.

(narrator) The cabin shared by the three bandsmen had a true continental feel to it.

There was Krins, born in France, raised in Belgium.

There was also a second Frenchman, cellist, Roger Bricoux, and the lone Englishman was Percy Taylor.

Percy Taylor was the oldest of the musicians, the only one that was married, and the least known.

There were never any obituaries in the British papers.

Titanic was the first ship Taylor had played on.

He spent most of his life in Southeast London.

He married widowed Clara Alice Davis in 1906.

At the time, he listed his occupation as an accountant.

The story passed down from the family is that it was an unhappy marriage and Percy Taylor took the job on Titanic to get away and start a new life in New York.

♪ (upbeat music) ♪ At 20 years old, cellist Roger Marie Leon Joseph Bricoux was the youngest of the band members.

Roger was raised in Catholic schools, first in Monte Carlo, and then over the border at a French-speaking school in Italy.

After graduation, Roger was accepted at Mozart's alma mater, the Accademia Filarmonica di Bologna in Italy.

The school had an excellent reputation for teaching Bricoux's instrument, the cello.

(Steve) He's born in France, but his father, who was a musician, was playing at the Grand Casino in Monaco, and so he spent his childhood years down there, he went to school there.

Then he went to a music school over the border in Italy.

So he would've been surrounded by music and also by affluence, because Monaco was on the up and up since they got the casino there.

And he was the youngest, but also one of the best trained, I think, really, in music, you know, having been to these schools.

(narrator) In 1910, Bricoux accepted a 12-month gig at the Grand Central Hotel in Leeds, England.

After his stay in Leeds, he would move to other venues before he received a trial offer as a ship's musician aboard the Carpathia.

Ironically, the Carpathia is the ship that would go on to rescue the Titanic survivors.

While on board the Carpathia, he wrote to his parents, "It is a trial voyage I'm making.

That is to say, they're trying me out for two months, paid of course, to see if I'm up to scratch, and afterward, I would have a good position."

Bricoux's tenure on the Carpathia proved successful.

His next ship was the Mauretania where he was to meet future Titanic bandsmen Theo Brailey and Wallace Hartley.

The three would arrive together as the Mauretania docked in Liverpool on April 8th, two days before Titanic sailed.

In Liverpool, they received the offer of a lifetime.

They were to create a new band on board the world's largest liner, the Titanic.

They would now have had just enough time to travel from Liverpool to Southampton to prepare for Titanic's departure.

Despite his travel, Roger Bricoux always stayed in touch with his parents.

While traveling to Liverpool aboard the Mauretania, he wrote his last letter to his father: "The boat's vibration is so annoying that I can't write.

Just think, we're doing 400 nautical miles in 24 hours, a world record.

Five days from New York to Liverpool.

I will write on board the Titanic.

Love to Mama and you.

Best wishes, Roger.

I am counting on a letter from you in New York."

(Steve) His letters home are very affectionate and warm and he's always considerate about his parents' health, and you get this idea of a young guy out, kind of exploring the world for the first time, but with a big heart and respect for his parents.

He's very excited about the prospect of being on the Titanic.

You know, it's heartbreaking, in a way.

He really is on the verge of life and on the verge of big things, and the Titanic is the biggest big thing that's come his way.

♪ (dramatic music) ♪ Originally, when bands began, they were members of the crew, but by the time Titanic came around, there was an attempt to reduce salary overhead, and so the band members were hired from an outside agency and traveled on board as second class passengers.

This was a double burden on the crew members, because legally, they were second class passengers, and they were technically emigrating to the United States every time they arrived, and therefore they had to have the legal minimum of cash on hand, and I believe that was $50 at the time.

(narrator) The Black Agency out of Liverpool, England, was the outside musical agency that provided musicians for Cunard and White Star.

Their offices were on Castle Street, just around the corner from the White Star Headquarters.

(Steve) What people refer to as the Black Agency was an agency run by Charles and Frederick Black, who were brothers.

And they were born in Manchester, they'd both studied music, they'd both been in orchestras.

They got to know musicians through being in the orchestras and thought, "Hey, we can make money by being agents."

The thing that they did which was not popular, certainly amongst the musicians in the musicians' union was that they got a monopoly on all of the major shipping lines going out of-- well, not only out of Liverpool, but out of Southampton.

(narrator) For any performer looking to land a spot in a ship's band, you had to go to and through the Black brothers.

(Steve) So whereas previously, musicians had signed on to the individual ships and got a lot more money, suddenly it was only the Blacks that did the deals and you had to go through the Black Agency, and basically, they took something like 50% of what would have been allocated for each.

And they also weren't covered by the normal insurance that a crew member would've been covered by, because they were employees of the Black Agency, not employees of the White Star Line.

Maybe that's neither here nor there until your ship hits an iceberg and it caused enormous problems.

The families of those that died weren't eligible to the sort of money you would've been if they'd have been covered by the Workmen's Compensation Act.

(narrator) Over the subsequent years, the families were denied any compensation from either White Star or the Black Agency for their loss.

♪ (bright music) ♪ While the trio played outside the À la Carte restaurant, the quintet performed for first and second class passengers at various times and in a variety of locations around the ship.

Their biggest performance would probably be in the reception room just before dinnertime.

(Charles) Going to dinner every night was a time of great splendor in first class, at least, as these beautifully dressed wealthy people came down the grand staircase.

They came into a reception room with a beautiful rose-colored carpet and a beautiful tapestry on the wall, and there were crystal light fixtures shedding a beautiful glow in the area of the reception room and a beautiful white painted room, it probably sparkled in their eyes in a way, and into this environment, you have this beautiful music, which ranged everything from classical pieces, operetta pieces, to the latest popular music.

Ragtime was very big in 1912.

(Bill) When the band performed in the reception room, it was actually off to the side in an inconspicuous spot, visible from all the room, but certainly not front and center.

I'm sure that those who were musical gravitated to the spot naturally.

Although it wasn't the center of attention, it was conspicuous.

For the pre-dinner period, the band was basically background music, the equivalent of Muzak, if you will.

There's a sense that this music could become wallpaper if it needed to be.

It was beautiful and tuneful and light, it was charming.

It was not something that required your full attention necessarily.

If you wanted to have a conversation over it during dinner or after dinner, you could play games.

It wouldn't be so distracting as some of the heavier classical music would.

(Charles) During the after dinner performance, the musicians were again playing, and this time, people were paying a little bit more attention to them.

They were sipping after dinner coffee and liqueurs and cordials and so forth, and the musicians, in addition to having chosen particular songs themselves, also were accepting requests from the passengers.

(lively music) ♪ (narrator) Pianist Theodore Brailey had been warned by his father, Ronald Brailey, not to sail on the Titanic.

Ronald was a clairvoyant and a well-known figure around the spiritualist circles of 1912.

(Steve) Ronald Brailey was a leading kind of spiritualist at the time.

I mean, that's another aspect of the Edwardian era, there was a lot of interest in things like spiritualism.

His father was quite prominent.

I found various articles in newspapers where he'd been brought in, and he did warn his son, he had a bad feeling about him going on the Titanic.

And then after his death, there were the reports of Brailey, Theo Brailey coming back and giving warm words of comfort from beyond the grave.

♪ (narrator) Growing up in Northern England, there had always been a piano in the Brailey home, and Theo, as he was called, was always encouraged to play.

It was said he had a marked talent for music with abilities that soon outpaced even his teachers.

When Theo was 15, he left home and joined the orchestra at Kensington Palace Hotel in West London.

Theo's next career move was unconventional, but not unexpected for a young man with a thrill-seeking streak.

He joined the army, signing up with the Royal Lancashire Fusiliers as a boy soldier.

(Steve) He did like adventure.

I mean, he was quite into aircraft as well, and there were guys flying sort of primitive biplanes up in Southport where he was a part of an orchestra in Southport.

And I think he must've gone out on these flights.

It was mentioned in his obituary that he was friendly with these very early aviators.

So, yeah, you've got the aviation, you've got the travel on ships and the army.

You know, he's not yet 30, so he's having quite a good life, really.

(narrator) At his own request, Brailey left the army early before his full term was up.

Around 1911, he went to sea for the first time on the Cunard Saxonia.

A year later, he would meet future Titanic bandsman Roger Bricoux on the Carpathia.

It was while he was on board the Carpathia that Brailey received the offer to play on Titanic.

Initially, he had reservations.

He had recently become engaged to a local girl, Theresa Steinhilber, and had vowed that he would leave the seagoing life behind.

And then there was a mystic warning from his psychic father, who felt the Titanic was headed for real danger.

(mellow music) ♪ Twenty-one-year-old violinist John Law Hume, called by his friends "Jock," might have been the most outgoing and fun-loving member of the group.

Fellow bandsman Louis Cross, who had played with Jock on an earlier ship, remembered his friend.

(Louis) The thing that hits me the hardest is the loss of happy Jock Hume.

Hume was the life of every ship he ever played on.

(man) He clearly had a very mischievous sense of humor, I gather that from my mother, and funny enough, I see it in my own son today who's also traveled the world and done so from a very young age.

I think he had-- he was an entertainer, and of course, the way to get tips on these ships, because he was paid four pounds for the return trip on the Titanic.

You know, the way to get a good tip was to make people laugh.

Jock managed to develop a keen sense of humor, despite an unhappy upbringing.

(Christopher) The interesting thing about Jock is that he comes from a classic, modern dysfunctional family.

His mother had died and his father married the woman next door.

She became the classic wicked stepmother.

(narrator) Music proved to be his escape.

Playing the fiddle gave him a ticket to travel and to get away from this dysfunctional, unhappy family, which was at war with itself.

(narrator) Hume had learned to play the violin while growing up in his native Dumfries, Scotland.

(Christopher) Jock was taught to play the violin at first by his father, and then at school.

They had a very-- he went to St. Michael's School in Dumfries, and there was a music teacher there who saw the talent he was and developed that talent.

(narrator) It didn't take long for young Hume to translate his considerable skills into a serious career.

(Christopher) Jock went to sea when he was 15, and he crossed the Atlantic five times in the year before his death.

He was already, at the age of 21, an old hand.

(narrator) Despite a love of the nomadic life of a ship musician, Hume showed signs he was ready to put down roots with fiancée Mary Costin.

Wedding plans were in the works.

But on the night before Jock sailed on Titanic, Mary shared the news with Jock that she was pregnant.

They were engaged to be married and they booked the church and everything from when he was coming back from New York after the maiden voyage of the Titanic.

Everybody was excited about that.

And her mother, Mary's mother, had welcomed Jock into the family.

What I do know is he welcomed the news that he was going to become a father.

Sadly, there would never be a wedding for young Jock and Mary, and Jock would never know the joys of being a father.

Titanic was set to sail April 10th, 1912.

♪ (solemn music) ♪ On April 10th, 1912, Titanic departed Southampton on her one and only voyage.

She next stopped at Cherbourg to pick up passengers, and then headed to her final port of call, Queenstown, Southern Ireland.

It was here that Wallace Hartley posted his final letter to his mother and father.

(Wallace) My dear parents, Just a line to say we got away all right.

It has been a bit of a rush, but I'm just getting settled.

This is a fine ship, and there ought to be plenty of money on her.

I've missed coming home very much, and it would have been nice to have seen you all, if only for an hour or two, but I couldn't manage it.

We have a fine band, and the boys seem nice.

I've had to buy some linen, and I sent my washing home today by post.

I shall probably arrive home on the Sunday morning.

We are due here on Saturday.

I am glad Mother's foot is better.

With love to all, Wallace.

(Charles) I think Wallace Hartley's letter referring to there being a lot of money on board was mainly an attempt to characterize the people who he found in first class.

There were actually seven millionaires on board who could have purchased the entire ship, probably, with their bank balances and never even felt it.

(narrator) For the bandsmen, they were about to sail with the rich and famous.

People like John Astor, the richest man in America, and steel tycoon Benjamin Guggenheim, along with the most famous Brit on board, journalist W.T.

Stead.

(Charles) You had all of the celebrities, all of the big names from 1912 were there listening to your music.

(dramatic music) ♪ (narrator) Second class passenger Kate Buss remembered cellist Wes Woodward.

(Kate) The musicians were such nice men.

I asked one night for a cello solo and got it at once.

The cello man is a favorite of mine.

Every time he finishes a piece, he looks at me, and we smile.

(narrator) John Wesley Woodward, or Wes as he preferred to be called, was 32 years old.

Like Hartley, he was raised in a strong Methodist family.

In 1900, he was awarded a licentiate as a teacher and performer of the cello by the Royal College of Music in London.

His music career took a leap forward when he was invited to join the Duke of Devonshire's band.

Wes met Jock Hume when he signed on for the maiden voyage of the Olympic.

Almost a year later, Wes and Jock again were selected for another maiden voyage.

This time, it was the Olympic's sister ship, the Titanic.

(lively music) ♪ The last Titanic bandsman boarded the ship with a very different purpose than his fellow performers.

Thirty-year-old contrabass player John Frederick Preston Clarke didn't see his post on the Titanic as a defining career move.

He saw it merely as a ride.

It wasn't because Clarke lacked credentials.

The Liverpool native learned to play the bass from an up-and-coming local violinist, Vasco Ackroyd, and later joined his teacher's symphony orchestra, earning rave reviews for performances at the Liverpool Philharmonic Hall.

He also worked in the orchestra pit at the Argyle Theater of Varieties in Birkenhead where Charlie Chaplin, Stan Laurel, and W.C. Fields once appeared.

Despite his talent, a personal matter was the motive for Clarke's trip.

Decades before, Clarke's father had abandoned the family and fled to the U.S. After years of no contact, Clarke learned his father had been killed in a house fire.

According to family legend, he took passage on the Titanic in hopes of making it to New York to settle his father's estate.

Titanic was going to be his first and only time at sea.

Clarke played his last concert with the Vasco Ackroyd Orchestra at the Philharmonic Hall on February 27th.

He met with friends several nights later before boarding the Titanic.

Perhaps with a slight bit of premonition, he told his drinking buddies... (Clarke) You know, it would be just my luck to go down with the ship.

I've kept away from it so long, it might finish me on this trip.

(solemn music) ♪ (narrator) Sunday April 14th, the day dawned cold but clear and sunny on the North Atlantic.

Titanic was four days away from New York.

For the members of the band, it was a normal workday.

Sunday morning church service followed by their normal performances around the ship, including lunch and dinner.

Later that day, Titanic stewardess Violet Jessop remembers seeing bandsman Jock Hume.

(Violet) On that Sunday evening, the music was at its gayest, led by young Jock, the first violin.

When I ran into him during the interval, he laughingly called out to me in his rich Scotch accent that he was about to give them a real tune, a Scotch tune to finish up with.

Always so eager and full of life was Jock.

(narrator) First class passenger Helen Churchill Candee later recalled... (Helen) After dinner, there was coffee served to all at little tables around the great general lounging place, for here the orchestra played.

Some said it was poor on its Wagner work, others said the violin was weak, but that was for conversation's sake, for nothing on board was more popular than the orchestra.

You could see that by the way everyone refused to leave it, and everyone asked of it some favorite hit.

At 11, folks drifted off to their big cabins with happy "see you in the mornings," and the only sounds the musicians made were those of instruments being shut in their velvet beds.

(telegraph beeping) (soft classical music) ♪ It was approaching midnight on the night of April 14th, and for the musicians, it had been a very long day.

They were tired.

Most people had already retired to their cabins.

The ship was quiet.

The iceberg made its appearance at 20 to midnight, and in the space of about 30 seconds, damaged the Titanic to the point where it could not survive.

We don't know how the ship's musicians learned of the damage to the ship.

The collision was so gentle that most people slept right through it.

There's question in my mind about why the band began to play.

I believe it may have been at the order of the purser.

He may have approached them and said, "Let's get you to an area where the passengers can hear you, and it may stimulate them into an ordered activity."

(narrator) Another possibility is that band leader Wallace Hartley led the band up on deck to play.

A fellow bandsman who had played with Hartley on another ship said later, "I don't suppose he waited to be sent for, but after finding how dangerous the situation was, he probably called his men together and began playing.

I know that he often said that music was a bigger weapon for stopping disorder than anything on Earth.

He knew the value of the weapon he had, and I think he proved his point."

♪ (Charles) Initially, they set up in the first class lounge, which for them was an unusual place, normally they didn't play there.

And gradually, as people moved from the interior of the ship to the exterior, they go up to the upper level, the boat deck level of the grand staircase.

(narrator) As the band was heading up the stairs that night, stewardess Violet Jessop again ran into violinist Jock Hume.

(Violet) As I turned, I ran into Jock, the band leader, and his crowd with their instruments.

"Funny, they must be going to play," thought I, "and at this late hour?"

Jock smiled in passing, looking rather pale for him, remarking, "Just going to give them a tune to cheer things up a bit!"

He passed on.

(telegraph beeping) (somber music) ♪ I think the conditions that night were exceptionally difficult, and there was one key ingredient that made it that way.

You had 2,225 people on board.

The lifeboat capacity was 1,178.

If every single seat in every single boat had been filled, half of the people on board were still destined to die.

Clearly, there was a situation that would have lent itself very well to people becoming panic stricken.

(narrator) Up until now, the band had played as a trio and quintet, but it is believed that on this night, for the first time, the musicians played together as a group.

♪ These guys were--basically, they went up on deck, they sat down, they played music.

They played music to calm the other people on deck.

As we know, the ship was sinking.

They would have known at some stage during those last few-- hour, hour and a half that there were not enough lifeboats for everyone.

So, inevitably, there were people that were going to go into the water.

The band men would've known that they would've been amongst those, and they played quite simply to calm the nerves of those on deck.

It got so bad that the crew actually had to form a circle locking their arms and allowing only women and children to come through that semi-circle to go into a lifeboat.

So the work of the musicians forestalled that panic for most of the evening.

(Alexandra) I don't believe that we can really answer the question of whether the music calmed them or not, but certainly I could see the musicians thinking that they would help, would start playing more marching music or light music, things that would keep people sort of occupied and not worried.

But then as it became closer to the sinking and they realized that there was no safety, then perhaps they started playing more of those things that came from their hearts.

♪ (mellow music) ♪ They did start out with fast numbers, and as the evening went on, they did maintain this rather high level of movement, if you will, like almost a fast dance, but toward the end, they began to play a little more somberly.

People on the decks were beginning to realize that there weren't any more boats, and this is where the band probably performed its strongest function.

It was very, very cold that night, probably down near freezing.

The ship's lights were starting to change in color.

Instead of them being a brilliant white, they were starting to take on a slightly reddish tinge, from the fact that the steam pressure was lessening, the generators were turning more slowly, even the lighting was beginning to become a little bit dicey.

They certainly could've been within their rights to say, "Let's finish, let's wrap this up, and each man for himself."

(narrator) It's believed that the last lifeboat left the Titanic shortly after 2 A.M.

There was little hope for the more than 1,500 people remaining on board.

But the band continued to play, giving comfort to those souls that remained.

(John P. Eaton) These were ordinary men.

They just were men doing a job, and yet they found this strength to face the enemy, in this case, as we know, the rising water, and they stood firm and they kept playing.

(somber music) ♪ (narrator) Toward the end of that tragic night, survivors remembered hymns being played.

♪ (Charles) Some reports say that it was Wallace Hartley who actually began Nearer, My God, To Thee on his violin.

The other men had basically stopped playing, probably wondering what to do next, probably making their own preparations for what was about to follow.

And Hartley began the strains of the hymn, and his colleagues decided that they would accompany him.

I think there's really no words to describe the heroism of that moment, because even if the bandsmen had assumed that they were performing a valuable service by preventing panic through their playing, that function was now finished.

So now they had really no reason to stand there anymore.

♪ (telegraph beeping) (somber music) ♪ (narrator) Titanic sank into the North Atlantic at 2:20 A.M. on April 15th, 1912.

1,517 souls were lost, including all the members of the Titanic band.

Nineteen days later, the bodies of Wallace Hartley, Jock Hume, and Preston Clarke were recovered.

Wallace Hartley's body was returned to his hometown of Colne, England.

Jock Hume and Preston Clarke are buried in Halifax.

The other five band members were never found.

The reason, quite simply, I think that the band are so popular over 100 years later is the heroism of these fine young gentlemen.

Here are a group of men who played until the bitter end as that ship was sinking in truly terrifying circumstances that we simply can't comprehend today that they were playing till the end, doing their duty until the bitter end.

♪ (Craig) The instinct would be to get off of that ship and in some way get to safety, so it took a lot, I think, and eight people did this together.

It took a lot to stay on that ship knowing that, as a result of doing that, they could've died, and they all did.

Although I can't say for sure what I would have done in that position, when I think about it, I think my first instinct would have been to get off that ship, and I think a lot of other people would have done the same.

I think they stayed for the music because it comforted them as well as everyone else on the ship, and if you're a musician, you might consider, "I want to play the best notes I've ever played, I want to make my violin sing.

I want everything to be perfect on this last song that I ever play."

So I think that that's probably one of the things that was passing through their heads and not thinking about what would happen after.

♪ (Charles) I think it's significant that they chose a hymn, according to legend, Nearer, My God, to Thee, as their final piece of music that night.

And in a way, that kind of served as a connection to their God, and it also served, I think, as an expression of what probably all of those left on board were thinking.

Their thoughts were on their faith and their God to get them through what now lay immediately ahead of them.

♪ (John P. Eaton) The entire ensemble was playing Nearer, My God, to Thee, and this was broken up only by the water that washed over them, and one by one, these men drowned.

And it's certainly one of the most inspiring stories related to the entire disaster, because people do remember hearing the music at the very end.

They played to the end, and they were men.

(bright music) ♪