Henry Purcell, composer

Henry Purcell‘s (1659-95) destiny was unsurprising in direction, though meteoric in impact on the musical sphere of Restoration Britain. Born in London, his father and uncle were both involved with the choirs at Westminster Abbey, so Henry naturally became a chorister, then the Abbey organist, whereupon he had the chance to compose even more music for the church.

Purcell was also appointed to the Chapel Royal at Hampton Court Palace and composed for the court in the new style that was emerging with the return of Charles II (1630-85) ~ the demand was for jollity with a Baroque Italian flavour.  Purcell’s elegant and inventive compositions accompanied the coronations of both James II (1603-1701) and William III (1650-1702) & Mary II (1662-94). His funeral music for Mary II was used for his own funeral only months later, after he died from an unknown cause.

His output was prolific in his short life and covered the whole range of chamber music, sonatas, odes, fantasias and songs. His 1689 opera, ‘Dido and Aeneas’, led to him concentrating on music for the theatre for the last years of his life. Eventually by 1965 the whole of his works had been published, thanks to the efforts of the Purcell Society, founded in 1876.

(Top images LtoR: Westminster Abbey choir: amanderson2 at Flickr.com / CC BY 2.0, Henry Purcell: picryl.com / Public domain)