Born in Derby, Dec 12, 1879
Died in Windsor, Sept 10, 1932
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FLETCHER, Percy
Nationality: English
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FOULDS, John
Born in Hulme, Manchester, Nov 2, 1880
Died in Calcutta, April 24, 1939
- Foulds was a cellist, conductor and composer who wrote salon music and music for the theater as well as more experimental works using techniques like quarter-tones and non-western modes.
- Foulds spent the latter portion of his life in India, studying Indian music and directing Western music radio programming for All-India Radio in Delhi.2
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GARDNER, John
Born in Manchester, March 2, 1917
Died in Liss Forest, Hampshire, December 12, 2011
- John Gardner was an organist, composer and teacher.
- Gardner was an organ scholar at Exeter College, Oxford before serving in WWII. Later he taught at several English colleges and schools, including the Royal Academy of Music.
- Gardner’s music is noted for eclecticism, with stylistic traits selected to fit the subject of each of his works, ranging from jazz to serialism to counterpoint to popular styles.3
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GIBBONS, Orlando
Born in Oxford, bap. Dec 25, 1583
Died in Canterbury, June 5, 1625
- Orlando Gibbons was a late Renaissance composer, keyboardist, and leading musical voice of 17th-century English polyphony.
- Gibbons came from a musical family – his father was a town wait in Cambridge, and his older brother was master of the choristers at King’s College, Cambridge.
- Beginning around age 20, Gibbons was a musician in the Chapel Royal until his death.
- For historical context, Queen Elizabeth I died in March 1603, making James I King of England. Given the date that Gibbons was first mentioned in the royal checkbook (May 1603), the musician’s employment likely coincided with the middle of this transitional period between monarchs.4
- Gibbons is best known for his choral anthems, which display his mastery of 17th-century polyphony.
- Historical fun fact – While serving as organist at Westminster Abbey, Gibbons officiated the funeral service of King James I.
- Musical fun fact – Gibbons’s Fantasies in Three Parts for Viols is believed to have been the first music printed from copperplates in England.5
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GIBBS, Armstrong
Born in Great Baddow, Essex, Aug 10, 1889
Died in Chelmsford, May 12, 1960
- C. Armstrong Gibbs studied music at Trinity College, Cambridge, and later took classes at the Royal College of Music with Vaughan Williams, Charles Wood and Adrian Boult.
- Gibbs was a composer, music educator and festival adjudicator.
- As a composer, Gibbs is best known for his songs.6
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GIPPS, Ruth, MBE
Born in Bexhill-on-Sea, Feb 20, 1921
Died in Eastbourne, Feb 23, 1999
- Gipps was a child prodigy: she began her music studies at age 3 (at the Bexhill School of Music, her mother was its principal) and her first composition was published when she was 8 years old.
- Gipps studied composition with Gordon Jacob and Ralph Vaughan Williams at the Royal College of Music. She also studied oboe and piano there.
- Gipps became a trailblazing conductor in Britain, conducting the City of Birmingham Choir and guest conducting ensembles like the Pro Arte Orchestra and the London Symphony Orchestra. When professional appointments were scarce because of her gender, she founded her own orchestras: the London Repertoire Orchestra and the Chanticleer Orchestra.
- Gipps served as a professor of music at Trinity College of Music and the RCM, and served as chair of the Composers’ Guild of Great Britain.1
Biography and partial works list from the British Music Collection
Sources
- Jill Halstead, Lewis Foreman, and J.N.F. Laurie-Beckett, “Gipps, Ruth,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed August 12, 2021, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000011199.
Pieces
The Kelpie of Corrievreckan, Op. 5
Piano Concerto in g minor, Op. 34
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GOOSSENS, Eugene
Born in London, May 26, 1893
Died in Hillingdon, Middx, June 13, 1962
- Sir Eugene Goossens was a conductor who began his career as an assistant to Sir Thomas Beecham.
- Goossens was a prominent conductor of opera in England, he directed the Cincinnati SO, Rochester SO and Sydney SO, and was instrumental in planning the Sydney Opera House.
- Goossens was of Belgian extraction. Both his father and grandfather were also named Eugene Goossens and both were conductors in Belgium.7
Born in London, Aug 12, 1696
Died in London, Dec 1, 1755
- Greene trained at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, first as a choirboy under Jeremiah Clarke and later as an organist. Soon he succeeded as organist at St. Paul’s.
- Greene’s organ students included prominent figures in the next generation of English organists, like William Boyce and John Stanley.
- Greene was a founder-member of a secular music performance organization, The Academy of Ancient Music (the original one, not the one founded in the 1970s).
- With his friend, composer and violinst Michael Festing, Greene helped found the Fund for the Support of Decay’d Musicians (which became the Royal Society of Musicians and is still supporting retired, injured or ill musicians).
- Near the end of his life Greene was working on an anthology of historical and modern English music. He did not complete the project, but his pupil William Boyce did, producing the massively influential collection Cathedral Music.
Fun (?) Facts: The Beef Between Handel and Greene.
- Greene was close friends with Handel for a time: apparently Handel loved playing the organ at St. Paul’s Cathedral, where Greene was organist.
“From Greene’s great admiration of Handel’s manner of playing, he had literally condescended to become his bellows-blower, when he [Handel] went to St. Paul’s to play on the organ…. Handel, after the three o’clock prayers, used frequently to get himself and young Greene locked up in the church together, and in summer often stript unto his shirt, and played till eight or nine o’clock at night.” Charles Burney, music historian and acquaintance of Handel.
- Unfortunately they had a falling out when Greene became friendly with Handel’s rival, the composer Bononcini. It is also possible that Handel envied Greene’s position in the Chapel Royal.
“Dr. Greene has gone to the devil!”Handel, on the occasion of Greene founding a concert series with Bononcini
“For many years of his life, Handel never spoke of [Greene] without some injurious epithet.”Charles Burney 1
Sources
- H. Diack Johnstone, “Greene, Maurice,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed February 11, 2020, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000011707.
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HARRIS, Sir William
Born in London, March 28, 1883
Died in Petersfield, Sept 6, 19738
- Fun fact – among his many other professional positions (choirmaster, organist, and composer), Harris was also the piano teacher to the young princesses Elizabeth and Margaret while he served as Director of Music of St George’s Chapel, Windsor.9
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HARRISON, Pamela
Born in Orpington, Nov 28, 1915
Died in Firle, East Sussex, Aug 28, 1990
- Pamela Harrison was an RCM-educated composer, pianist, and scholar of Dalcroze eurythmics. Her teachers included Gordon Jacob and her composition influences included Bax and Ireland.10
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HESS, Nigel
Born in 1953
- Nigel Hess is a television, theater and film composer who studied at Cambridge University.
- He was Company Music Director of the Royal Shakespeare Company from 1981-5, writing music for twenty Shakespeare productions there.
- Some of Hess’s many TV credits include music for the BBC series Maigret and Hetty Wainthrop Investigates.11
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HOLBORNE, Anthony
Born c.1545
Died c. 29 Nov – 1 Dec 1602
- Little is known of Anthony Holborne. He published two collections of music during his lifetime: The Cittharn School (London, 1597) and Pavans, Galliards, Almains and Other Short Aeirs both Grave, and Light, in Five Parts, for Viols, Violins, or Other Musicall Wind Instruments (London, 1599).12
- The cittharn (cittern) is a member of the lute family.
- Holborne’s brother William Holborne was also a composer, and contributed some pieces to The Cittharn School.13
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HOLST, Gustav
Born in Cheltenham, Sept 21, 1874
Died in London, May 25, 1934
Pieces
- A Moorside Suite
- Brook Green Suite (string orchestra)
- In the Bleak Mid-Winter
- Lyric Movement for Viola and Small Orchestra
- The Perfect Fool
- The Planets, Op. 32
- The Planets: “Neptune, the Mystic”
- The Planets: “Venus, the Bringer of Peace”
- Three Pieces for Oboe and String Quartet, Op. 2
- Two Songs without Words, Op. 22 (Country Song; Marching Song)
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HOWELL, Dorothy
Born in Birmingham, Feb 25, 1898
Died in Malvern, Jan 12, 1982
- Howell was a pianist and composer who studied at the Royal Academy of Music. She also taught harmony and counterpoint there from 1924-1970.
- Howell’s style is neoromantic and many of her works feature the piano, a reflection of her performance specialization in that instrument.14
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HOWELLS, Herbert
Born in Lydney, Gloucestershire, Oct 17, 1892
Died in London, Feb 23, 1983
- Herbert Howells was a distinguished English composer best known for his choral and organ music, though he also wrote songs, piano works, and chamber/ orchestral music. His Three Carol Anthems (which includes “A Spotless Rose”) helped bring the young composer to prominence.
- Howells studied at the Royal College of Music and was a pupil of Charles Villiers Stanford (Stanford even described Howells as his “son in music”). Hubert Parry, director of the institution at the time, also made a significant impact on the young composer. Parry’s “philosophy and humanity inspired a deep and lasting affection.”15
- Howells was deeply affected by the death of his nine-year-old son, Michael, in 1935 due to polio. Everything Howells wrote after that significant life event was in some way written in memory of Michael.
- Howells’s ability to express deep emotion and pathos is part of what has made his music so powerful and enduring.
- As a composer, Howells felt a strong connection to music from the Tudor era (as did Vaughan Williams), which is evident in much of his music.16
- Fun fact – Howells had a love of cathedral architecture and often wrote church music for specific buildings.17
“Howells is a composer whose music stirs profound emotional reactions from performers and audiences alike.”18
Short biography from the Herbert Howells Trust
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IRELAND, John
Born in Bowdon, Cheshire, Aug 13, 1879
Died in Rock Mill, Washington, Sussex, June 12, 1962
- John Ireland studied composition with Stanford, at the RCM, worked as a choirmaster and organist.
- Ireland eventually taught at the RCM himself, where his students included Benjamin Britten.20
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JACOB, Gordon
Born in London, July 5, 1895
Died in Saffron Walden, June 8, 1984
- Gordon Jacob was an English composer, educator, and writer.
- He studied at the Royal College of Music with Sir Charles Villiers Stanford, Herbert Howells, Ralph Vaughan Williams, and many other notable English musicians.
- Not long after finishing his studies, Jacob joined the teaching staff at RCM himself, where he held a position for over 40 years. His pupils included Sir Malcolm Arnold, Imogen Holst, Elizabeth Maconchy, and Ruth Gipps.
- Like many of his English colleagues, Jacob avoided the rise of the Avant-Garde in the mid-20th century. His music was influenced by early 20th-century French and Russian schools of thought.
- In a BBC TV documentary in 1959, Jacob said, “I personally feel that the day that melody is discarded, you may as well pack up music altogether.”
- Fun fact – Jacob provided music for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953.21
Born in Maidstone, 1592
Died in Kimberley, Norfolk, Oct 27, 1678
- Jenkins was a lutenist, a player of the lyra viol, and a composer of consort music.
- Jenkins worked for many wealthy English patrons as a performer and a teacher and was also connected with the royal court after the Restoration.22
- Fun Fact: the lyra viol is a small bass viol sometimes known as the viola bastarda
“He was a person of much easier temper than any of his faculty, he was neither conceited nor morose, but much a gentleman, and had a very good sort of wit, which served him in his address and conversation, wherein he did not please less than his compositions.”
Roger North, on Jenkins. English writer, biographer, and amateur musician Roger North was of Jenkins’ music students. (The Autobiography of the Hon. Roger North, 79.)
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LANE, Philip
Born in Cheltenham, 1950
- Philip Lane studied music at Birmingham University.
- Lane composes music for BBC plays and for TV animation as well as concert music, and has often been called upon to reconstruct vintage film scores from minimal resources, including transcribing by ear from video recordings.23
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LEIGHTON, Kenneth
Born in Wakefield, Oct 2, 1929
Died in Edinburgh, Aug 24, 1988
- Leighton was a child chorister at Wakefield Cathedral, studied composition at Queen’s College, Oxford, and went on to teach at Leeds University, Oxford, and Edinburgh University.
- Style: Leighton composed many pieces of choral sacred music, and his instrumental works are also influenced by liturgical tradition, with themes frequently inspired by plainsong or chorales.24
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LEWIS, Paul
Born in 1943 in Brighton, England
- Lewis was inspired to enter the world of TV music when he saw Lawrence Olivier’s films with music by William Walton when he was 12.
- Lewis chose to avoid professional music training, instead opting to leave school at 15 to work in music publishing.
- Lewis wrote his first TV score at age 19 and has been working busily for British TV ever since.
- Fun fact: among other shows, Lewis’s production library music can be heard on Antiques Roadshow and SpongeBob SquarePants.25
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LLOYD, George
Born in St Ives, Cornwall, June 28, 1913
Died in London, July 3, 1998
“I never wrote 12-tone music because I didn’t like the theory. I studied the blessed thing in the early 1930s and thought it was a cock-eyed idea that produced horrible sounds. It made composers forget how to sing.”1– George Lloyd
- George Lloyd was an English composer and conductor who became an icon for anti-modernism in classical music.
- Lloyd studied at Trinity College of Music and the Royal Academy of Music. By his late teens/ early twenties, he had composed his first symphony (Symphony No. 1, 1932)and his first opera (Iernin, 1933-34).
- Lloyd was highly inspired by Verdi in his writing, particularly in his operas.
- During WWII, Lloyd served with the Royal Marines as a bandsman. During a shipping accident, the composer was one of only four survivors and suffered from oil ingestion and shell shock (not to mention trauma).
- Following his recovery from the war, Lloyd intermittently composed while also working as a market gardener in Dorset. About 20 years later, in 1973, he moved to London and once again took up composing full-time, with great success. The last 20 years were seen as a renaissance for the composer.2
Learn More
Biography from the George Lloyd Society (lots of photos!)
Short biography from BBC Music Magazine
Sources
- “George Lloyd (1913 – 1998),” The George Lloyd Society, accessed April 25, 2023, https://georgelloyd.com/george-lloyd/george-lloyd-biography.
- Lewis Foreman, “Lloyd, George,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed April 25, 2023, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000016822.
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Born in Exeter (probably), 1621–3
Died in London, shortly before Aug 10, 1677
- Matthew Locke was the leading composer of Restoration England. He was employed by the royal court under Charles II (Composer to the King’s “Private Music”) as well as several other aristocratic establishments in England.
- Locke was trained in the Exeter Cathedral choir, where he studied with Edward Gibbons (brother of Orlando Gibbons) and became a prominent organist.
- Locke also wrote extensively for the London theater. His works include incidental music for The Tempest (1675), a masque on he story of Orpheus and Euridice, and a score for a semi-sung work called Psyche, which helped pave the way for semi-operas by later English Baroque composers, notably Henry Purcell.
- At Locke’s death, Purcell took over his position as composer for the royal ensemble, the 24 Violins. Purcell was friends with the older composer, and wrote a musical elegy for him, “On the Death of his Worthy Friend Mr. MATTHEW LOCKE’, What hope for us remains now he is gone? (Z472).26
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LYON, David
- Sir George MacFarren was one of the 19th century’s most prolific English composers, particularly popular in his time for his choral works.
- MacFarren was one of the first English musical nationalists, influenced by folk song, and by English history and folklore.
[I] “worked hard, not for the sake of work, but for the love of work”
Sir George MacFarren, on his prolific output 27
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MOERAN, Ernest John
Born in Heston, Middlesex, England, Dec 31, 1894
Died near Kenmare, Co. Kerry, Ireland, Dec 1, 1950
- Moeran was a prodigy who started to compose as a child, studied at the RCM, and later studied privately with John Ireland.
- Moeran’s study at the RCM was interrupted by service in WWI. He initially served as a motorcycle dispatch rider, and was wounded in France in 1917.
- In 1918 his battalion was sent to Ireland to deal with republican unrest. He collected a lot of Irish folk songs while he was there, and went back to collect more after he left military service.
- Coming from an affluent family, Moeran had the ability to compose whatever music appealed to him, rather than having to worry about earning money from his works. He also had the ability to finance performances of his own music.
- From 1925-1928 he shared a cottage with Philip Heseltine (Peter Warlock). Their home became a notorious partying house. Unfortunately, Moeran developed a debilitating alcohol dependency at this time, which affected his ability to compose.28
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NYMAN, Michael
Born in London, March 23, 1944
- Nyman’s music often employs experimental techniques, like aleatoric procedures and postmodern quotation or sampling from historic compositions.
- Later in his career Nyman’s music became lyrical and more influenced by folk music.
- Fun fact: As writer on music, Nyman was one of the first people to use the term “minimal” for the music we now describe as “minimalist.”
- Nyman has composed scores for a number of films, including Gattaca (1997) and The Libertine (2004). 29
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ORR, Charles Wilfred
Born in Cheltenham, July 31, 1893
Died in Painswick, Feb 24, 1976
- Orr is best known as a composer of art songs, particularly his settings of A.E. Housman’s poetry.
- Orr and his wife lived a quiet life in the countryside because Orr was ill with eczema and tuberculosis most of his adult life.
- Orr’s composition mentors included Frederick Delius and Peter Warlock.1
Sources
- Jane Wilson, “Orr, C(harles) W(ilfred),” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed November 19, 2019, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000020497.
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Born in Bournemouth, Feb 27, 1848
Died in Rustington, Sussex, Oct 7, 1918
- Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry was one of the foremost English composers, music scholars and teachers of the 19th century and did much to revitalize music education standards in England.
- Parry’s most influential musical mentor was Edward Dannreuther, who was largely responsible for aiding Parry’s passion for Richard Wagner‘s music.
- Parry was Director of the Royal College of Music from 1895 to the end of his life. Due to this role, in addition to his position as Heather Professor of Music at Oxford from 1900-08, Parry was essentially the face of British classical music at the time.
- At the Royal College of Music, some of Parry’s pupils included Ralph Vaughan Williams, Gustav Holst, Frank Bridge, and John Ireland.
- Fun fact: Parry worked for George Grove as a sub-editor for the first edition of Grove’s Dictionary of Music and Musicians. Parry wrote more than 100 articles in the first Grove’s.30
“Although Parry’s ceremonial music embodies a sense of strength and confidence, on a deeper level his musical language imparts something much more aspirational – a longing for a better world in which music will help to raise humanity to new heights.”31
Born in Norwich, 1623
Died in London, between Dec 24, 1686 and Feb 7, 1687
- John Playford was an English bookseller, music publisher.
- Note that, though he appears in MusicMaster and in this site under the heading “composer” (there’s nowhere else to put him) he’s actually a publisher who compiled and preserved anonymous tunes in The English Dancing Master – he didn’t write the music.
- Playford was the foremost London music printer in the late 1700s. He founded a publishing dynasty in which his sons Henry Playford and nephew John Playford II took part.
- Playford had a strong impact on English Baroque music, especially sacred music (a special interest of his). The poet Nahum Tate wrote an elegy at Playford’s death, which Henry Purcell set to music.32
Born in London, 1658 or 1659
Died in London, Nov 21, 1695
- In addition to his opera Dido and Aeneas and other dramatic works, Purcell composed extensively for the church and for the keyboard.
- Purcell was trained as a choirboy in the Chapel Royal, under the direction of Pelham Humfrey.
- Purcell composed for the English royal court throughout his life, and also served as organist of Westminster Abbey.33
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QUILTER, Roger
Born in Hove, Nov 1, 1877
Died in London, Sept 21, 1953
- Quilter was best known as a writer of English art song, especially favoring texts by Shakespeare, Shelley and Herrick.34
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RUTTER, John
Born in London, Sept 24, 1945
- In addition to his remarkably successful career as a composer of choral music, Rutter has also served as director of music at Clare College, Cambridge, founder-director of The Cambridge Singers, and an editor of choral music.35
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SCOTT, Cyril
BBorn in Oxton, Cheshire, Sept 27, 1879
Died in Eastbourne, Dec 31, 19701
- Cyril Scott was an incredibly prolific composer and pianist. He composed approximately 400 works during his lifetime, including orchestral music, operas, oratorios, chamber music, choral works, piano works, and songs.
- Conductor Eugene Goossens is said to have called Scott “the father of modern British music.”2
- Scott belonged to the Frankfurt Group, a group of composers who studied with Iwan Knorr at the Hoch Conservatory in the late 1890s. Other group members included Roger Quilter, Henry Balfour Gardiner, Percy Grainger, and Norman O’Neill.
- In addition to his work in music, Scott was also a writer, poet, and painter. His literary output includes several volumes of poetry, several unpublished plays, and an autobiography, My Years of Indiscretion.
- In the 1920s, Scott became a follower of the Higher Occultism and also took a keen interest in naturopathy, osteopathy, and homeopathy. Scott subsequently wrote several books and articles related to these topics in addition to his other writings. 3
- You can view some of Scott’s watercolor paintings here.
Sources
- Michael Hurd, “Scott, Cyril,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed September 6, 2022, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000025249.
- Desmond Scott, “About Scott’s Music,” Cyril Scott: The official Cyril Scott website, accessed September 6, 2022, http://www.cyrilscott.net/music#/about-scott-music/.
- Michael Hurd, “Scott, Cyril,” Grove Music Online.
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SMYTH, Dame Ethel
Born in London, April 22, 1858
Died in Woking, May 8, 1944
Name Pronunciation
There is no consensus.
This article (2018) claims that Smyth’s family pronounced the name “Smith,” not “Smythe”
This dissertation (see p. 136) discusses Peter Avis’s theory that it should be pronounced with a long “i” and an unvoiced “th,” like “Forsyth.”
- This account also says that Smyth’s friend Sir Thomas Beecham was no use as a source on this issue because he always called her Dame Ethel. (That’s a brilliant way to stay out of the controversy.)
In her autobiography Streaks of Life, Ethel Smyth tells a humorous story in which she seems surprised that a woman pronounces her name to “rhyme with ‘scythe.’”
Biography
- Smyth studied music at the Leipzig Conservatory, and privately in Leipzig. Her associates during her time living in Leipzig included Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms.
- Smyth was particularly interested in opera. She composed six, including The Wreckers (composed 1902-4).
- In 1910-1912, Smyth was romantically involved with suffragist Emmeline Pankhurst, and she became deeply involved in the women’s suffrage movement, including composing the suffrage anthem March of the Women.
- Smyth was also a prolific and popular writer, and the author of two memoirs.
- From the 1920s onward, Smyth received broader recognition for her work, including being made a Dame of the British Empire. She used her late-career celebrity to support the careers of women in music: for example, she lobbied for women to be hired in professional British orchestras.1
Biography from Exploring Surrey’s Past
- Also includes biographical timeline, works list, and access to the The Lewis Orchard Collection at Surrey History Centre.
Sources
- Sophie Fuller, “Smyth, Dame Ethel,” Grove Music Online (2001), accessed July 7, 2021, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000026038.
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SOMERVELL, Sir Arthur
Born in Windermere, June 5, 1863
Died in London, May 2, 193736
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STOKOWSKI, Leopold
Born in London, April 18, 1882
Died in Nether Wallop, Hants., Sept 13, 1977
- Famous for: conductor of Philadelphia Orchestra (1912-36)
- Famous for: collaborating with Disney on Fantasia (1940)37
- Stokowski worked to make classical music popular and accessible; for this purpose, made many lush orchestral arrangements of works by Bach (especially Bach’s organ works, because Stokowski was an organist.)38
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TALLIS, Thomas
