Fanfare for the Common Man is a musical work by American composer Aaron Copland. The piece was written in 1942 for the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra under conductor Eugene Goossens. It was inspired in part by a famous speech made earlier in the same year where vice president Henry A. Wallace  proclaimed the dawning of the "Century of the Common Man". Several alternative versions have been made and fragments of work have appeared in many subsequent US and British cultural productions, such as in the musical scores of movies.