Sir Hubert Hastings Parry

One of the greatest figures in Victorian music, was born at Bournemouth in 1848, but divided his boyhood and youth between his home in Rustington and Highnam Court, Gloucestershire. He was the son of Gambier Parry, whose frescoes in Gloucester and Ely Cathedrals and in the Church of Holy Innocents, Highnam, which be built and endowed, attest his skill.

 

Hubert, a boy genius, began musical composition before he was nine, and, going to Eton at 15, took his degree as Bachelor of Music in his first term. He distinguished himself as greatly at Exeter College, Oxford, where he was a fine athlete, a notable scholar, and the main-spring of varsity musical life.

He spent his holidays in Germany learning the language, studying opera and playing the piano and viola. At 25 he married a sister of fhe Earl of Pembroke and settled down to life on the Stock Exchange, and it is said that in idle moments he set the Shipping List to music.

 

Finally he left the City for his true vocation and devoted himself to composition and teaching. One of the first to understand and appreciate Wagner, Parry broke away from convention and imparted a strain of originality into English music that at first shocked, but ultimately charmed, his public.

 

He wrote much on his favourite avocation, biographies of musicians, musical history, and technical works on art and style in music.

He was for many years Professor of Music at Oxford and a brilliant Director of the Royal College of Music. His compositions were in the main for instrumental performance, but he wrote oratorios, songs, chants, madrigals, cantatas, and music that will live for the Greek plays of Aristophanes, in addition to State music for the coronation of King Edward and of King George; and with his setting of Blake's Jerusalem he gave us a second national anthem.

He was a passionate lover of outdoor life, a noted yachtsman, and the boon companion of poets, artists, and musicians. He died in October 1918, and was buried in the crypt of St Paul's.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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