19 September 2007

17th century musick

[from King's College London]

Jeremiah Clarke (1673?-1707) was himself a noted composer, best remembered today for his popular Trumpet Voluntary. He received his musical education at the Chapel Royal under John Blow and later became its organist, as well as Vicar Choral of St. Paul's. Found dead in his lodgings with a bullet in his brain, he was believed to have committed suicide as a result of a failed love affair. His death caused the poet Edward Ward, author of The London spy, to observe:

Let us not therefore wonder at his fall,
Since 'twas not so unnatural
For him who liv'd by Canon to expire by Ball.


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