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Basil Harwood

1859 - 1949 Person Name: Basil Harwood (1859-) Composer of "WHEATLEY" in The Oxford Hymn Book Basil Harwood (11 April 1859 – 3 April 1949) was an English organist and composer. Basil Harwood was born in Woodhouse, Gloucestershire (the second youngest of 12 children) on 11 April 1859. His mother died in 1867 when Basil was eight. His parents were Quakers but his elder sister Ada, on reaching 21 in 1867, converted to the Anglican Church. Basil was allowed to attend the ceremony at the Church of England in Almondsbury and this is where he was first drawn to organ music and choral singing. His father, Edward, remarried two years later in 1869 to a lady from an Anglican family. Basil was now sent to the Montpellier School in Weston-super-Mare for a year. In 1871, at 12 he was enrolled in Clevedon, the preparatory school for Charterhouse where he was first to formally study music. He went up to Charterhouse in 1874 and left in 1876 having won a leaving Exhibition to Trinity College, Oxford where he initially studied Classics (1879) and Modern History (1880). He then studied for a further two years, 1881–1882, at the Leipzig Conservatory under Carl Reinecke and Salomon Jadassohn. It was here in 1882, Basil composed his first anthem for chorus and organ "O Saving Grace." He returned from Leipzig to realise that he had now passed the age limit to study music formally. In 1883, Basil became organist of St. Barnabas Church, Pimlico completing his Sonata in C# Minor here in 1885, selling the copyright to the publisher Schott for one shilling a year or two later. After this success, he then moved to Ely Cathedral in 1887 where he wrote the bulk of Dithyramb, possibly his greatest organ work. His final appointment was as organist at Christ Church, Oxford and as precentor of Keble College, Oxford from 1892 to 1909. Whilst there he co-founded and conducted the Oxford Bach Choir which helped to earn him his degree as Doctor of Music. He conducted the Oxford Orchestral Association (1892–1898). He was musical editor of the 1908 Oxford Hymn Book and Examiner for Musical Degrees (1900–1925). During this time, he met and married Mabel Ada Jennings (the daughter of George Jennings) (who had become a pupil of his in 1896) at All Souls St. Marylebone, London (27 December 1899). Mabel had studied music herself, piano and composition, and was also a writer. She may well have composed lyrics for some of his lesser known tunes. At an advanced age she wrote a small volume of collected poems named Questing Soul. He retired early at 50 (in 1909) after the death of his father, Edward Harwood, from whom he inherited the family estate of Woodhouse having outlived his seven older brothers. Soon after moving in he had a three manual chamber organ built in the library by Bishop & Sons of Ipswich (now in Minehead Parish Church), on which he promptly finished his Sonata in F# Minor. He continued to compose prolifically. He was a keen walker, and named many of his hymn tunes after local places that he loved to visit, the most notable being the hymn tunes such as Tockington, Olveston, Almondsbury and Thornbury. In 1936 advancing in years, he let the Woodhouse estate and moved to Bournemouth. Part of the estate, Woodhouse Down, was later sold to his contemporary Robert Baden-Powell who was two years older than he was and who had also attended Charterhouse School, and is used as a Scout Camp to this day. In 1939, at eighty, he moved to London, taking a flat in Fleet Street. After a long life, he died on 3 April 1949, eight days short of his 90th birthday, at Courtfield Gardens in the Royal Borough of Kensington, London. A memorial service was held in St Paul's Cathedral on 22 April 1949. Mabel survived him, dying shortly before her 103rd birthday on 20 July 1974. He was survived by two sons; Major John Edward Godfrey Harwood (1900–1996) and Basil Antony Harwood (1903–1990) Senior Master of the Supreme Court, Q.B.D. and Queen's Remembrancer. His remains are interred in St. Barnabas Church, Pimlico and marked by a plaque inset in floor of the chancel, close to where he would have stood to conduct the choir. He composed cantatas, church music and works for the organ; his Service in A flat, the anthem O how Glorious and the hymn tunes LUCKINGTON ("Let all the world in every corner sing") and THORNBURY ("Thy hand O God has guided"), first used during a festival of the London Church Choir Association, remain in the Anglican repertory. --en.wikipedia.org/wiki

E. H. Thorne

1834 - 1916 Person Name: Edward Henry Thorne Composer of "HOLY SEPULCHRE" in The Cyber Hymnal Thorne, Edward Henry; b. 5-9-1834, Cranbourne, Dorset, d. 12-26-16, London; organist and compos

I. Gregory Smith

1826 - 1920 Person Name: Isaac Gregory Smith, 1826-1920 Author of "By Jesus' grave on either hand" in Songs of Praise Smith, Isaac Gregory, M.A., son of Rev. Jeremiah Smith, B.D., was born at Manchester, Nov. 21, 1826, and educated at Rugby and Trinity, Oxford, where he held both the Hertford (1846), and Ireland (1847) scholarships, B.A. 2nd cl. Lit. Sum. 1849. Taking holy orders, he was preferred to the rectory of Tedstone-de-la-Mere, Hertfordshire, 1854; and the Vicarage of Great Malvern, 1872. From 1852 to 1855 he held a fellowship at Brasenose, Oxford, and was also Bampton Lecturer in 1873, his subject being The Characteristics of Christian Morality. In 1870 he became Prebendary of Pratum Minus in Hereford Cathedral, in 1882 Bural Dean of Powick, and examining Chaplain to the Bishop of St. David's, and in 1887 Hon. Canon of Worcester. Prebendary Smith has published, in addition to his Bampton Lectures, an Epitome of the Life of Our Blessed Saviour, &c, Fra Angelica and other Poems, and other works. He has also contributed hymns to the collection of which he was co-editor, and to the Rev. O. Shipley's Lyras. In preparing A Hymn Book for the Services of the Church, and for Private Heading, London, Parker, 1855, 2nd ed., 1857, he was assisted by his brother John George Smith, Barrister-at-Law, and the Rev. W. S. Raymond. To this collection Canon Smith contributed: 1. By Jesu's grave on either hand. Easter Eve. 2. The tide of years [time] is rolling on. The Circumcision and the New Year. and a translation of "Adeste Fideles." In addition to these the following are in the Westminster Abbey Hymn Book, 1884:— 3. Adown the river, year by year. Second Advent Desired. 4. Comes at times a stillness as of even. Death Anticipated. Written for the unveiling of the Albert Memorial in Edinburgh, and set to music by Sir H. S. Oakeley. 5. The day-beam dies Behind yon cloud. Winter Evening. There is also in Pt. ii. "For Reading," in the Hymn Book of 1855, a sweet hymn on Heaven beginning "Come away, where are no shadows in a glass." --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology (1907) ================== Smith, I. G., p. 1062, ii. Dr. Smith corrects the note on "Comes at times a stillness as of even," and says respecting it:— "In 1857, so far as I can tell, I wrote 'Comes at times,' and the interval was very short between the last part and the first. It was not written for the Prince Consort's memorial.nor for any occasion— July26, 1905." --John Julian, Dictionary of Hymnology, New Supplement (1907)