A march, as a musical genre, is a piece of music with a strong regular rhythm which in origin was expressly written for marching to and most frequently performed by a military band. In mood, marches range from the moving death march in Wagner's Götterdämmerung to the brisk military marches of John Philip Sousa and the martial hymns of the late 19th century. Examples of the varied use of the march can be found in Beethoven's Eroica Symphony, in the Marches Militaires of Franz Schubert, in the Marche funèbre in Chopin's Sonata in B flat minor, the "Jäger March" in the Op. 91a by Jean Sibelius, and in the Dead March in Handel's Saul.

Marching refers to the organized, uniformed, steady walking forward in either rhythmic or route-step time; and, typically, it refers to overland movements on foot of military troops and units under field orders. Marching is often performed to march music and is typically associated with military and civilian ceremonial parades. It is a major part of military basic training in most countries and usually involves a system of drill commands.