Composer, organist, teacher, writer and broadcaster, Herbert Howells (1892-1983) is a major figure in English music. His three choral masterpieces, Hymnus Paradisi, the Stabat Mater and Missa Sabrinensis, are classics, while his ecclesiastical music - quite possibly sung daily in Britain - is the greatest contribution to Anglican Church music of the twentieth century.
Born in humble circumstances in rural Gloucestershire, Howells held posts at Salisbury Cathedral, the Royal College of Music, St John's Cambridge and St Paul's Girls School. He was taught by Brewer, Stanford and Parry; a fellow student of Gurney and Bliss; a friend of the poet de la Mare and of composers such as Vaughan Williams and Finzi. Behind the outstanding compositions and a career in the 'establishment' lay a life-threatening disease, the death of Howell's nine year old son, and a forty-year period of mourning. There also lay personal insecurities: vanity, social climbing, an all-consuming attraction to women. Paul Spicer views these flaws with the same honesty and integrity he applies to his assessment of Howells' music.
"An engrossing, admirable written and important biography. Howells deserved a good and sympathetic biographer and he has found one in Spicer"
Michael Kennedy
"Howells the man is sensitively, even vividly drawn; his diaries and other sources have been thoroughly researched and used with perceptive care and great skill. His stature as composer is enhanced: moreover his complexities, his human strengths and weaknesses are captured in a meaningful way. The reader feels repeatedly drawn towards listening to the music - no better test of a musical biography"
Terry Barfoot, BBC Music Magazine
"Concise, superbly written, fulfilling and enjoyable, with enough detail and nuance about Howells to bring his personality to life"
Jeffery Carver, Choral Journal
"In the space of 204 very readable pages he paints as rounded a portrait of the man and his music as anyone could wish"
Gurney Society Journal
Paul Spicer is Organist at Lichfield Cathedral and Professor of Choral Conducting at the Royal College of Music. He is an acclaimed composer in his own right.
