Sir Charles Villiers Stanford 1852 - 1924



Sir Charles Villiers Stanford (30 September 1852 – 29 March 1924) was an Irish composer, born in September 1852. He was born in Dublin into an affluent and musical family.

Stanford studied at Trinity College Dublin and Queen’s College Cambridge and between 1874 and 1877 in both Leipzig and Berlin. While still an undergraduate, Stanford was appointed organist of Trinity College, Cambridge.

In 1883, aged 31, he became one of the founding professors of the Royal College of Music, where he taught composition for the rest of his life. In 1887 he became a Professor of Music at Cambridge and although he resigned his organist post at Trinity College, he also continued in the role of Professor of Music at Cambridge for the remainder of his life. Stanford received a knighthood on the occasion of King Edwards coronation in 1901.

Stanford was a prolific composer and he is credited with over 200 opus numbers. His compositions included operas, many symphonies, choral works of festival scale, and string quartets as well as many other compositions.

It is regarded by some that Stanford’s music was neglected in the years after his death. It was fortunate however that this did not extend to his ecclesiastical works. In a book entitled ‘Music in Britian’ the author Nicholas Temperely remarks that Stanford's services in A (1880), F (1889) and C (1909) are the most important and enduring additions from those years to the cathedral repertory and are surely widely known to all Cathedral Visiting Choirs.

His other ecclesiastical compositions included ‘When Mary Thru The Garden Went'. This was sung by Sanderstead Singers at St Pauls cathedral on Easter Monday 2016.

The following is a recording of Stanford's 'When Mary Thru' The Garden Went' sung at St Paul's Cathedral on 26th January 2016. This is an unaccompanied piece and the conductor was Fred Irvine. The recording is a Dartworth recording.



Acknoledgement: The information about the life and times of Charles Villers Standford was taken from an Obituary published in the Times on March 31st 1924 and an article in Wikipedia, for entries dated to 4th March 2016.

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