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Johann Sebastian was the most outstanding member of a family that, for nearly 300 years, remained distinguished in the world of music. Trained in the choir schools of Ohrdruf and Lneburg, he became organist and choirmaster at Arnstadt 1703-07; Mühlhousen 1707-8; Weimar 1708-17; Anhalt-Cöthen 1718-23; and finally Leipzig 1723-50, where he was Cantor of the famous St Thomas's school and director of music in two churches.
Both as player and composer he is considered the greatest organist of all time. His preeminence as a composer was not fully realized until Mendelssohn in particular championed his music in the early nineteenth century. He left a prodigious quantity of music in all forms except opera. He made much use of Lutheran chorales as themes in his music and was especially sensitive to the spiritual significance of their texts. Since 1906, when several were introduced in The English Hymnal, over 370 of his chorale harmonizations have been used extensively in British hymnals. He also wrote a few original hymn tunes in a style less massive than that of the chorales.
(See also GDM; OCM)
For indexes to Chorales and Cantatas &c. (relating to hymns and tunes in Rejoice & Sing), click here > > >
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(See also DNB; Julian p.107)
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(See also DNB; GDM; Julian p.114)
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Educated at the John Lyon School, Harrow, and Selwyn College, Cambridge, he taught at Cheltenham Grammar School and then became Head of Modern Languages at his old shool in 1974. He was organist and choirmaster at the Church of the Holy Apostles, Cheltenham 1971-74; Emmanuel Church, Northwood, Middlesex 1975-87; and at St Alban's Church, N.Harrow, since 1988.
He was a member of the Music Committee for HTC and several other publications of the `Jubilate' group, and is a prolific composer and arranger.
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He was a chorister at York Minster from the age of 7; he became an organist at 12 and choirmaster at 14. He studied at the Royal Academy of Music; and was organist and choirmaster at various London Churches including St Anne's, Soho, 1871-86, where his annual performances of Bach's St John Passion became renowned. He conducted the first English church performance of Bach's St Matthew Passion in Westminster Abbey in 1871.
From 1861 to 1876 he was musical adviser to the firm of Novello, who in 1867 established for him an amateur oratorio choir which became known as `Barnby's Choir'. Later he was conductor of the Royal Choral Society. He was Precentor (i.e. Director of Music) at Eton College 1875-92, resigning to become Principal of the Guildhall School of Music.
Among his compositions are an oratorio, vocal solos, part-songs, and church music including 246 hymn tunes; some of the latter he published in 1869 in a collection of Original Tunes to Popular Hymns for Church and Home. He was co-editor of The Cathedral Psalter and Music Editor of four hymnals, most notably The Hymnary 1872. He was knighted in 1892.
(See also DNB; GDM; OCM)
and the Hymnals and Psalters mentioned above.
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Educated at Kilburn Grammar School and the Royal Academy of Music, he was organist of Tetherdown Congregational Church, Muswell Hill, N.London 1954-56; Bloomsbury Central Baptist Church 1956-82; the American Church in London 1981-84; and St Columba's Church of Scotland, Pont Street, London SW1 from 1988.
He served on the editorial committees of the Baptist Hymn Book 1962, Praise for Today 1974, Hymns & Psalms 1983 and Baptist Praise & Worship 1991.
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A son of the manse, he was educated at Banff Academy; Craigmillar School, Edinburgh; and Edinburgh University. He was Director of Music at Ackworth School, near Pontefract, Yorkshire 1942-45; and at Glasgow Academy 1945-51. He then joined Aberdeen University's Department of Music and Drama, becoming its Head in 1956 until his death in a road accident. He was convenor of the Scottish Churches' Music Consultation at Dunblane, 1967.
He was an expert on the music of Haydn; his own compositions include church music, three operas, and concertos for violin and double bass.
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Following graduation from the New York Law School in 1898 and admission to the New York State bar in 1899, he took up engineering work. He had 250 patents to his credit; and was chief engineer and vice-president of the Symington-Gold Corporation of Rochester, N.Y. 1924-47.
An enthusiastic musician in the Episcopal Church, he was a chorister and later choirmaster of Grace Church, Rutherford N.J.; then of St John's Church, Boonton N.J.; and organist and choirmaster of Christ Church, Rochester N.Y. He had a 32-stop pipe organ in his own home!
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He was the eldest of sixteen children of a French father and Irish mother. He is said to have held a commission in the Irish Brigade, but forsook that for music. A brilliant violinist, he played in a Paris theatre orchestra, came to England in 1764, married a niece of Dr Arne's wife, and became leader of several orchestras. He gained the acquaintance of many persons of distinction, including royalty, and became a close friend of Haydn when that composer visited London. Most of Barth‚lemon's compositions were for the theatre, but he wrote a small amount of church music including some voluntaries for organ.
(See also DNB; GDM; OCM)
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Having studied at North Sydney Technical High School and the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, he was Assistant Director of Music at the King's School, Parramatta 1952-57; then Tutor in Church Music at Radley College, Melbourne 1958-60. He then read theology there, and was ordained in 1961. He was Precentor of St Andrew's Cathedral, Sydney, 1962-68; and cathedral organist in 1965. He was then Rector of St Thomas's, Enfield, 1968-75; then Rector of St Michael's, Vauclause, Sydney, and Canon of the Cathedral.
He served as Anglican representative on the committee for the Australian Hymn Book / With One Voice 1977 and as its executive secretary; as chairman of the committee for its Supplement Sing Alleluia 1987; and as chairman for its successor hymn-book Together in Song 1999.
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After study at the Guildhall School of Music he became a free-lance opera coach, conductor and pianist. He has been Music Director of many West End shows, including Phantom of the Opera and Carmen Jones. He is also organist and choirmaster of Palmers Green URC, London.
He was a member of the Music Sub-committee during the preparation of Rejoice & Sing.
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He initially chose banking as a career but was ordained in 1956. After curacies in Nottingham and Reigate he was Candidates Secretary of the Church Pastoral Aid Society 1961-64; Rector of Holy Trinity, Rusholme, Manchester, 1964-70; Vicar, then Rector of All Souls', Langham Place, London, 1970-82; and Bishop of Chester 1982-96.
A keen musician, he was editor of Youth Praise I and II, 1966/69 (jointly with Timothy Dudley-Smith); Psalm Praise 1973; and Consulting Editor of Hymns for Today's Church 1982/87. His books include Moses and the Venture of Faith; Getting through to God; A Spiritual Health Warning to the Church; Chained to the Gospel; and The Evidence for Christ.
and the three hymn-books mentioned above.
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(See also DNB; OCEL; Julian p.118b)
He was born in in the small village of Rowton, eleven miles north-east of Shrewsbury, which was his mother's and maternal grand-parents' home. His father, also Richard, was a "Freeholder" but not well-to-do; and the young Richard lived with his grand-parents for the first ten years of his life. His early education was in the less than competent hands of a series of tutors. At the age of 11 he was placed in a school at Wroxeter; and five years later he was persuaded, to his subsequent regret, to study with Richard Wickstead of Ludlow, then Chaplain to the Council of the Welsh Marches, instead of going to one of the Universities.
The remainder of his formal education was no better served; he read widely on his own initiative, but later wrote of his time at Ludlow
" ... Besides the Latin Tongue, and but a mediocrity in Greek (with an inconsiderable trial at the Hebrew long after) I had no great skill in Languages ... And for the Mathematicks, I was an utter stranger to them."
In 1638 he was ordained deacon and appointed School-master of a new school at Dudley, Worcestershire. Both in the school appointment and in Baxter's decision to seek ordination, he was greatly influenced by James Berry, who subsequently became a prominent and powerful Dissenter, a senior officer in Cromwell's administration and a member of the House of Lords during the period of the Commonwealth. Although Baxter remained a convinced and loyal Conformist, ecclesiastically and politically, his relationships with Non-conformist churches and ministers was always ambivalent, and he never entirely disowned his sympathies in that direction.
The rest of Baxter's complex career is summarised here. He became an Assistant minister at Bridgnorth in 1640 (the Church there being a "royal peculiar", not subject to Episcopal jurisdiction), and in the following year at Kidderminster; these appointments were as "preacher or lecturer", not to the living itself. At the outbreak of the Civil War in 1642 he moved to Gloucester, then to Coventry, and found himself drawn into the field battles as a Chaplain to the Parliamentary army, although his declared loyalty was "to King and Parliament" -- a position which proved to be unsustainable.
In 1647 he returned to Kidderminster at the invitation of many of the parishioners, ostensibly in his previous position as preacher and lecturer, but shortly afterwards (without his knowledge and against his exressed wish) appointed to the living itself, the previous incumbent being quietly pensioned off with one-fifth of the income.
During his time in Kidderminster he was vigorously opposed by the Revd John Tombes, incumbent at Beaudley (Bewdley) not far distant. See the biography of John Tombes in Aubrey's Brief Lives, where the controversial exchanges between Baxter and Tombes are described.
His own position worsened after the Restoration of the Monarchy. He moved to London and became one of the King's Chaplains, with an influential part in the proceedings of the "Savoy Conference". But he suffered much abuse, and occasional imprisonment, both under Charles II and James II. In spite of this, he continued to preach whenever and wherever the opportunity arose, and to produce his huge output of writings, doctrinal, devotional, polemic and autobiographical, together with poems and hymns. (An annotated list of Baxter's works was compiled by A.G.Matthews in 1932, with the titles of 133 books or pamphlets published in Baxter's life-time and six posthumous collections.)
In September 1662 he married Margaret Charlton, the daughter of a widow parishioner at Kidderminster, after a period of growing friendship and mutual spiritual dependency. Margaret was twenty-one years younger than Richard, but the couple were totally devoted to one another throughout her life. She died in 1681, aged 45, after a short illness; he was broken with grief, and never wholly recovered his composure. (His poem "My whole, though broken heart", better known in the cento beginning "Lord, it belongs not to my care", expresses some of his intense feelings at the time.)
The remainder of his life was far from peaceful; three times he was arrested for seditious preaching, the third arrest leading to a year's imprisonment at Southwark, from which he was released in November 1686.
The Toleration Act of 1689 brought him some relief from harassment, but "growing Distempers and Infirmities ... confined him first to his Chamber, and after to his Bed". He died in December 1691 and was buried with his wife in Christ Church, Newgate.
Major biographies of Baxter have been written; these include a two-volume Life by F.J.Powicke: Vol.(i) Life of the Reverend Richard Baxter, 1924; Vol.(ii) The Reverend Richard Baxter under the Cross (1662- 1691), 1927; and Geoffrey Nuttall: Richard Baxter, Nelson 1965.
A shorter but substantial Life was written by J.G.Whittier, included (with other essays) in a six-volume edition of Whittier's collected Works (Vol. 6, Old Portraits and Modern Sketches; Personal Sketches and Tributes; Historical Papers, London, Macmillan 1889). Click here > > for a full transcription of this essay.
and the Baxteriana noted in this Enchiridion.
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(See also DNB; OCEL; Julian pp.124b-125a)
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(See also DNB)
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(See also Julian p.1612b)
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(See also Julian, pp.136-7)
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(See also Julian pp.137 & 1612b-1613a)
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He came of a musical family, his father being organist of Auxerre Cathedral for 50 years. Jacques Berthier studied in Paris at L'École César Franck. A fellow student there was Joseph Gelineau, at whose suggestion Berthier was asked to compose music for the Taizé Community.
It seems that, at least in the early days, the composition was partly collaborative: modifications to his drafts would be suggested by the Community until the desired form was reached. (A comparison may be made with the composition methods used by John Bell and Graham Maule with other members of the Iona Community: see note on Wild Goose Songs )
Although the music was originally published anonymously, Berthier's name appeared on later collections. His Taizé pieces have been described as possibly the world's most widely sung contemporary Christian music; but he also composed much music in larger, more traditional forms for the Roman Catholic liturgy.
Not himself a member of the Taizé Community, he was organist 1961-94 of the Jesuit Church of St Ignace, Paris.
and the notes on Wild Goose Songs and the Iona Community referenced above.
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Her father was Philip N.Shuttleworth, Warden of New College, Oxford from 1820-40 and Bishop of Chichester 1840 until his death in 1842. Emma Frances is generally referred to by those names, and is described as such in Julian (p.139b &c.). However, several of her publications (see below) give her name on title pages simply as `Frances Bevan', and in publishers' advertisements on the end papers as `Frances A.Bevan'; it seems unlikely that this was done without her agreement. We have not been able to verify her registered or baptismal names; but it may be conjectured that her second name may have been `Amelia' and that `Emma' was adopted as a familiar alternative.
In 1856 she married L.C.Bevan, a Lombard Street banker.
She was noted for her study of German hymn-writers and mystics and for her many translations of German hymns and poems. Her publications included Three Friends of God (i.e. Tauler, Nicolas and Suso), 1887, and Hymns of Ter Steegen, Suso and Others, 1st Series 1894, 2nd series undated.
(See also Julian p.139b)
and the notes on her books referenced above.
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End of Biographies B1 Return to Top . . .
(The Rejoice & Sing Enchiridion:edited by David Goodall; last amended 28/12/03)