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Fred Kaan

1929 - 2009 Person Name: Fred Kaan, 1929- Author of "Now Let Us from This Table Rise" in Worship and Rejoice Fred Kaan Hymn writer. His hymns include both original work and translations. He sought to address issues of peace and justice. He was born in Haarlem in the Netherlands in July 1929. He was baptised in St Bavo Cathedral but his family did not attend church regularly. He lived through the Nazi occupation, saw three of his grandparents die of starvation, and witnessed his parents deep involvement in the resistance movement. They took in a number of refugees. He became a pacifist and began attending church in his teens. Having become interested in British Congregationalism (later to become the United Reformed Church) through a friendship, he was attended Western College in Bristol. He was ordained in 1955 at the Windsor Road Congregational Church in Barry, Glamorgan. In 1963 he was called to be minister of the Pilgrim Church in Plymouth. It was in this congregation that he began to write hymns. The first edition of Pilgrim Praise was published in 1968, going into second and third editions in 1972 and 1975. He continued writing many more hymns throughout his life. Dianne Shapiro, from obituary written by Keith Forecast in Independent (http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/fred-kaan-minister-and-celebrated-hymn-writer-1809481.html)

William Knapp

1698 - 1768 Person Name: William Knapp, 1698-1768 Composer of "WAREHAM" in Hymns of the Saints Born: 1698, Wareham, Dorsetshire, England. Died: September 26, 1768, Poole, Dorsetshire, England. Buried: Poole, Dorsetshire, England.

Robert Jackson

1840 - 1914 Composer of "NIAGARA" in Voices United After receiving his musical training at the Royal Academy of Music, Robert Jackson (b, Oldham, Lancashire, England, 1840; d. Oldham, 1914) worked briefly as organist at St. Mark's Church, Grosvenor Square, in London. But he spent most of his life as organist at St. Peter's Church in Oldham (1868-1914), where his father had previously been organist for forty-eight years. A composer of hymn tunes, Jackson was also the conductor of the Oldham Music Society and Werneth Vocal Society. Bert Polman

Basil Harwood

1859 - 1949 Adapter of "DEUS TUORUM MILITUM" in The United Methodist Hymnal 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

Ralph Vaughan Williams

1872 - 1958 Harmonizer of "DEUS TUORUM MILITUM" in The United Methodist Hymnal Through his composing, conducting, collecting, editing, and teaching, Ralph Vaughan Williams (b. Down Ampney, Gloucestershire, England, October 12, 1872; d. Westminster, London, England, August 26, 1958) became the chief figure in the realm of English music and church music in the first half of the twentieth century. His education included instruction at the Royal College of Music in London and Trinity College, Cambridge, as well as additional studies in Berlin and Paris. During World War I he served in the army medical corps in France. Vaughan Williams taught music at the Royal College of Music (1920-1940), conducted the Bach Choir in London (1920-1927), and directed the Leith Hill Music Festival in Dorking (1905-1953). A major influence in his life was the English folk song. A knowledgeable collector of folk songs, he was also a member of the Folksong Society and a supporter of the English Folk Dance Society. Vaughan Williams wrote various articles and books, including National Music (1935), and composed numerous arrangements of folk songs; many of his compositions show the impact of folk rhythms and melodic modes. His original compositions cover nearly all musical genres, from orchestral symphonies and concertos to choral works, from songs to operas, and from chamber music to music for films. Vaughan Williams's church music includes anthems; choral-orchestral works, such as Magnificat (1932), Dona Nobis Pacem (1936), and Hodie (1953); and hymn tune settings for organ. But most important to the history of hymnody, he was music editor of the most influential British hymnal at the beginning of the twentieth century, The English Hymnal (1906), and coeditor (with Martin Shaw) of Songs of Praise (1925, 1931) and the Oxford Book of Carols (1928). Bert Polman

Thomas Tallis

1505 - 1585 Person Name: Thomas Tallis, ca. 1505-1585 Composer of "TALLIS' CANON" in Worship and Rejoice Thomas Tallis (b. Leicestershire [?], England, c. 1505; d. Greenwich, Kent, England 1585) was one of the few Tudor musicians who served during the reigns of Henry VIII: Edward VI, Mary, and Elizabeth I and managed to remain in the good favor of both Catholic and Protestant monarchs. He was court organist and composer from 1543 until his death, composing music for Roman Catholic masses and Anglican liturgies (depending on the monarch). With William Byrd, Tallis also enjoyed a long-term monopoly on music printing. Prior to his court connections Tallis had served at Waltham Abbey and Canterbury Cathedral. He composed mostly church music, including Latin motets, English anthems, settings of the liturgy, magnificats, and two sets of lamentations. His most extensive contrapuntal work was the choral composition, "Spem in alium," a work in forty parts for eight five-voice choirs. He also provided nine modal psalm tunes for Matthew Parker's Psalter (c. 1561). Bert Polman

Samuel Webbe

1740 - 1816 Person Name: Samuel Webbe, the elder, 1740-1816 Composer of "MELCOMBE" in CPWI Hymnal Samuel Webbe (the elder; b. London, England, 1740; d. London, 1816) Webbe's father died soon after Samuel was born without providing financial security for the family. Thus Webbe received little education and was apprenticed to a cabinetmaker at the age of eleven. However, he was determined to study and taught himself Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, German, and Italian while working on his apprenticeship. He also worked as a music copyist and received musical training from Carl Barbant, organist at the Bavarian Embassy. Restricted at this time in England, Roman Catholic worship was freely permitted in the foreign embassies. Because Webbe was Roman Catholic, he became organist at the Portuguese Chapel and later at the Sardinian and Spanish chapels in their respective embassies. He wrote much music for Roman Catholic services and composed hymn tunes, motets, and madrigals. Webbe is considered an outstanding composer of glees and catches, as is evident in his nine published collections of these smaller choral works. He also published A Collection of Sacred Music (c. 1790), A Collection of Masses for Small Choirs (1792), and, with his son Samuel (the younger), Antiphons in Six Books of Anthems (1818). Bert Polman

Melvin West

1930 - 2019 Person Name: Melvin West (1930-2019) Arranger of "DEUS TUORUM MILITUM" in Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal

John Wilson

1905 - 1992 Person Name: J. W. Harmonizer of "SOLOTHURN" in Hymns for Celebration Born January 21, 1905, in Bournville, Birmingham, England; died July 16, 1992, in Guildford, Surrey, England. He served as Vice President of the Hymn Society of Great Britain and Ireland, and was a Fellow of the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada. Leland Bryant Ross from a biographical article in the journal of the Hymn Society of Great Britain and Ireland: https://hymnsocietygbi.org.uk/1992/10/treasure-no-58-john-wilson-1905-92