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John Blow
| Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: John Blow |
| Music Encyclopedia: John Blow |
(b Newark, bap. 23 Feb 1649; d Westminster, 1 Oct 1708). English composer. He was trained as a Chapel Royal chorister and then worked as organist of Westminster Abbey, 1668-79. In 1674 he both became a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal and succeeded Pelham Humfrey as Master of the Children; from 1676 he was also an organist there. Henry Purcell served an apprenticeship under him and many others were influenced by his teaching. The 1680s and 1690s were his most productive years as a composer. While still active at the Chapel Royal (where he was named official composer in 1700), he was Almoner and Master of the Choristers at St Paul's Cathedral in 1687-1703, and in 1695 he returned to Westminster Abbey as organist, succeeding Purcell.
Blow was the most important figure in the school of musicians surrounding Purcell and a composer of marked individuality. His music uses a wide range of idioms and reflects his interest in structure. Foremost in his sacred output are c 100 anthems, mostly verse anthems (some with instrumental movements); the powerful coronation work God spake sometime in visions (1685) combines features of both types. Blow also wrote several services and Latin sacred works. Most of his odes were written for court occasions; among the others are works for St Cecilia's Day such as Begin the song (1684). The highly original and poignant miniature opera Venus and Adonis (1685), also for the court, was his only dramatic work. A well-known part of his output was his secular vocal music, comprising c 90 solo songs and several duets, catches etc; the Ode on the Death of Mr Henry Purcell (1696), a duet with instruments, is notable for its expressiveness. Blow's instrumental works include organ voluntaries and some 70 harpsichord pieces.
works:Dramatic music
- Venus and Adonis, masque (by 1685)
- 12 services
- c 100 anthems, incl. God spake sometime in visions (1685)
- Latin works
- over 20 court odes
- 10 odes for other occasions
- over 120 songs, duets and trios, incl. Ode on the Death of Mr Henry Purcell, duet (1696)
- catches
- c 30 org voluntaries
- over 70 hpd pieces (some grouped in suites)
- 3 pieces for strs
- sonata
| Columbia Encyclopedia: John Blow |
Blow, John, 1649-1708, English composer. He was organist and choirmaster at Westminster Abbey and the Chapel Royal and the teacher of Henry Purcell. He wrote more than 100 anthems and 10 sacred services, mostly unpublished, and a masque, Venus and Adonis.
| Artist: John Blow |
- Period: Baroque (1600-1749)
- Born: February 23, 1649 in Newark-on-Trent, Nottinghamshire, England
- Died: October 01, 1708 in Westminster, England
- Genres: Vocal Music
Biography
English composer John Blow was an important influence on Henry Purcell; his organ compositions, court odes, songs, and single opera, Venus and Adonis, are his most important works.Blow was born in February 1649 and was baptized on the 23rd of that month. He became a choirboy in the Chapel Royal at an early age and must therefore already have served in that capacity in another church, perhaps in Newark. Blow studied with the chorus master Henry Cooke, and later with Christopher Gibbons, the son of Orlando Gibbons. In December 1668, Blow was given the post of organist at Westminster Abbey, a prestigious position indicating his considerable keyboard skills. A month later he was taken into the royal court to serve as a performer on the virginal. In 1670, anthem, Blow took on the young Henry Purcell as a student and was given the post of composer-in-ordinary for voices, an indication his vocal works had already found much favor.
Blow was taken into the service of the Chapel Royal in March 1674, and in July he was named to a post there as children's chorus master. During this period Purcell began a more intense regimen of studies with Blow, and a friendship between the two arose. In 1674, Blow married Elizabeth Braddock; she would bear him five children, of whom two would die before reaching adulthood and Elizabeth herself lived a decade into their union. Blow was appointed one of three organists at the Chapel Royal in 1676.
During this time and until 1685 -- the year of James II's coronation -- Blow composed most of his anthems and his opera Venus and Adonis, written with librettist Aphra Behn. In the late 1670s, he began composition of a large number of songs, which appeared in anthologies from 1679 through 1684. Blow also began writing many odes during this period. His Begin the Song (1684), the first of his St. Cecilia's Day Odes, for vocal soloists, chorus, and instrumental ensemble, is one of Blow's greatest achievements.
Blow continued composing at a fairly prolific rate in the latter years of the seventeenth century and garnered further posts, including master of choristers at St. Paul's Cathedral, in 1687. The death of Henry Purcell on November 21, 1695, was a devastating loss for Blow. He was moved by the event to write his most fomous work in 1696, An Ode on the Death of Mr. Henry Purcell.
In 1700 Blow was appointed to the position of composer of the Chapel Royal, the top ranking job for a composer in England at the time. Ironically, his output slowed to a trickle in succeeding years, and what little he did produce was not necessarily new: the 1702 anthem, The Lord God Is a Sun and Shield, for vocal soloists, chorus, instrumental ensemble, and organ, for instance, is based on the 1686 effort of the same title. Blow died on October 1, 1708, in London. ~ All Music Guide, All Music Guide
| Wikipedia: John Blow |
John Blow (baptised 23 February 1649 – 1 October 1708) was an English composer and organist. His pupils included William Croft and Henry Purcell.
Blow was probably born at Newark-on-Trent in Nottinghamshire. Although there is some speculation that he was born at North Collingham, Nottinghamshire, the parish registers there do not mention anyone named Blow, whereas those at Newark record the baptisms of Blow and of his brother and sister, the marriage of his parents, and the burial of his father. Furthermore, the register of Lambeth degrees notes that in 1677, on taking his doctorate, he himself declared on oath that his birthplace was ‘the faithful borough of Newark’. His date of birth is not known, but he was baptised 23 February 1649 and was likely born only a short while before. He became a chorister of the Chapel Royal, and distinguished himself by his proficiency in music.
He composed several anthems at an unusually early age, including Lord, Thou host been our refuge, Lord, rebuke me not and the so-called "club anthem", I will always give thanks, the last in collaboration with Pelham Humfrey and William Turner, either in honour of a victory over the Dutch in 1665, or more probably simply to commemorate the friendly intercourse of the three choristers.
To this time also belongs the composition of a two-part setting of Robert Herrick's Goe, perjur'd man, written at the request of Charles II to imitate Giacomo Carissimi's Dite, o cieli. In 1669 Blow became organist of Westminster Abbey. In 1673 he was made a gentleman of the Chapel Royal and in the September of this year he married Elizabeth Braddock, who died in childbirth ten years later.
Blow, who by 1678 was a doctor of music, was named in 1685 one of the private musicians of James II. Between 1680 and 1687 he wrote his only stage composition of which any record survives, the Masque for the entertainment of the King, Venus and Adonis. In this Mary Davis played the part of Venus, and her daughter by Charles II, Lady Mary Tudor, appeared as Cupid.
In 1687 he became master of the choir of St Paul's Cathedral; in 1695 he was elected organist of St Margaret's, Westminster, and is said to have resumed his post as organist of Westminster Abbey, from which in 1680 he had retired or been dismissed to make way for Purcell. In 1699 he was appointed to the newly created post of Composer to the Chapel Royal.
Fourteen services and more than a hundred anthems by Blow are known. In addition to his purely ecclesiastical music Blow wrote Great sir, the joy of all our hearts, an ode for New Year's Day 1682, similar compositions for 1683, 1686, 1687, 1688, 1689, 1693 (?), 1694 and 1700; odes, and the like, for the celebration of St Cecilia's Day for 1684, 1691, 1695 and 1700; for the coronation of James II, two anthems, Behold, O God, our Defender and God spake sometimes in visions; some harpsichord pieces for the second part of Henry Playford's Musick's handmaid (1689); Epicedium for Queen Mary (1695) and Ode on the Death of Purcell (1696). In 1700 he published his Amphion Anglicus, a collection of pieces of music for one, two, three and four voices, with a figured bass accompaniment.
A famous page in Charles Burney's History of Music is devoted to illustrations of Blow's "crudities", most of which only show the meritorious if immature efforts in expression characteristic of English music at the time, while some of them (where Burney says "Here we are lost") are really excellent. Blow died on 1 October 1708 at his house in Broad Sanctuary, and was buried in the north aisle of Westminster Abbey.
The tercentenary of his death was marked by BBC Radio 3 and Westminster Abbey with the weekly broadcast of choral evensong being made by the choir of Westminster Abbey, live from the Abbey, and consisting of music mostly by him, or by his near contemporaries.[1]
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References
- ^ Choral Evensong from Westminster Abbey on the anniversary of the death of John Blow, BBC Radio 3. Retrieved 1 October 2008.
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica, Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: John Blow |
- Free scores by John Blow in the Choral Public Domain Library (ChoralWiki)
- Free scores by John Blow in the Werner Icking Music Archive (WIMA)
- Free scores by John Blow in the International Music Score Library Project
- John Blow MIDI file "Fair Celia" Tony Catalano's Classical Guitar MIDI Page
| Cultural offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Albertus Bryan |
Organist and Master of the Choristers of Westminster Abbey 1668–1679 |
Succeeded by Henry Purcell |
| Preceded by Henry Purcell |
Organist and Master of the Choristers of Westminster Abbey 1696–1708 |
Succeeded by William Croft |
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Learn More
 | Club Anthem |
| Blow: Ode on the Death of Henry Purcell (1998 Album by Various Artists) |
| John Blow |
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 | Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. Britannica Concise Encyclopedia. © 2006 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. All rights reserved. Read more |
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Mentioned in
- Club Anthem
- Blow: Ode on the Death of Henry Purcell (1998 Album by Various Artists)
- John Blow
- Henry Cooke
- Thomas Tudway (music)
- Jeremiah Clarke (Classical Artist)
- John Hingeston (Classical Artist)
- Trouble Over Here, Trouble Over There (1987 Album by Trouble Funk)
- William Croft (Classical Artist)
- L'Orgue Dom Bedos de Saint-Croix de Bordeaux (Classical Album)
- Purcell: Divine Hymns (Classical Album)
- Meditations on a Theme by John Blow, for orchestra, Op. 80, F. 118 (Classical Work)
- Trumpet Voluntary (Classical Work)
- Voluntaries for organ (Classical Work)
