Maurice Greene (composer)

Maurice Greene ( born August 12, 1696 London, † December 1, 1755 ) was an English composer and organist of the Baroque.

Life and work

Maurice Greene was born the son of a clergyman and was under Jeremiah Clarke and Charles King (1687-1748) choir boy at St Paul's Cathedral. After his voice broke, he studied under Richard Brind organ and was named after Brinds death in 1718 organist at St. Paul's. From his late adolescence until after commencement of the position at St. Paul's, he was a friend of Handel, which he gave access to the organ of the cathedral and he introduced Brind, with whom he quarreled violently but later.

1727 Greene was after the death of William Croft organist at the Chapel Royal, and in 1730 he became Professor of Music at the University of Cambridge. 1735, he was " King's Musick Master of the " appointed, a prestigious post at the British royal court, the occupied except him about John Eccles and Edward Elgar.

At the time of his death, Greene worked on the collection Cathedral Music, which was William Boyce complete, his pupil and successor as Master of the King's Musick. Many pieces in this compilation are today still in Anglican church services in use.

Greene wrote quite a lot of vocal music, both sacred and secular, including the oratorio The Song of Deborah and Barak ( 1732), musical settings of sonnets of Edmund Spenser's Amoretti ( 1739 ), and a collection of Anthems ( 1743), the most famous of the Lord, let me know mine end is.