Chorley, Henry F(othergill)
Chorley, Henry F(othergill)
Chorley, Henry F(othergill), English writer on music; b. Blackley Hurst, Lancashire, Dec. 15, 1808; d. London, Feb. 16, 1872. He was at various times active as a dramatist, translator, art critic, poet, novelist, and journalist. From 1831 to 1868 he was music critic of the London Athenaeum. During his extensive travels he heard all the best music of the day and met many musical celebrities. A partisan of Mendelssohn and Spohr, he was intolerant toward new musical ideas and attacked Chopin, Schumann, and particularly Wagner, with extraordinary violence. In addition to his writings on music, he also pubi, a novel, A Prodigy: A Tale of Music (three vols., 1866).
Writings
Music and Manners in France and Germany (3 vols., London, 1841); Modern German Music (2 vols., 1854); Thirty Years’ Musical Recollections (2 vols., 1862; abr. American éd., N.Y., 1926); Autobiography, Memoirs and Letters (2 vols., 1873; ed. by H.G. Hewlett); National Music of the World (1880; ed. by Hewlett; 3rd ed., 1911); Handel Studies (1859).
Bibliography
.I R. Bledsoe, H.F. G: Victorian Journalist (Brookfield, Vt., 1998).
—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire