(b c 1674; d London, 1 Dec 1707). English composer and organist. He was a chorister at the Chapel Royal in the 1680s, then was organist at Winchester College (c 1692-1695) and in 1699 became vicar-choral and organist of St Paul's Cathedral, London, advancing to Master of the Choristers in 1703. He was also a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal and from 1704 joint organist with Croft. He is thought to have committed suicide because of an unhappy love affair with a pupil of noble birth. Clarke is best known as a composer of the Trumpet Voluntary, long attributed to Purcell, but now known to be ‘The Prince of Denmark's March’ from an anthology of harpsichord music (1700); it also appears in a suite for wind instruments. His other works include some services and c 20 anthems (mostly fairly slight), a number of odes for court occasions and other celebrations, and a quantity of songs and interludes for the theatre, which, along with his harpsichord pieces, best show his pleasing and tuneful style, not reflecting the ‘melancholy cast’ ascribed to him by contemporaries nor indeed the circumstances of his own death.

The Concise Grove Dictionary of Music. Copyright © 1994 by Oxford University Press, Inc.. All rights reserved.