Ebenezer Prout

Ebenezer Prout in the late 1890s

Ebenezer Prout (born March 1, 1835 in Oundle , † December 5, 1909 in Hackney ) was an English musicologist , music teacher and composer .

life and work

Ebenezer Prout showed musical talent early on, but this was not encouraged by his father. Therefore, apart from some piano lessons, he acquired his knowledge of music autodidactically . From 1852 he worked as a school teacher, but in 1859 he turned his career entirely to music, initially as a singing teacher at a school in Hackney and by accepting private students. He also worked as an organist and from 1861 to 1885 as a professor of piano at the Crystal Palace School of Art . In 1862 and 1865, respectively, his string quartet op. 1 and the piano quartet op. 2 won prizes from the Society of British Musicians .

From 1876 to 1882 Prout taught at the National Training School for Music , from 1879 at the Royal Academy of Music - where Henry Wood , Edward German and Tobias Matthay were among his students - and from 1884 at the Guildhall School of Music . From 1876 to 1890 he headed the Hackney Choral Association, for which he wrote the two cantatas Hereward (1878) and Alfred (1882).

From 1876 onwards, starting with instrumentation , he wrote a series of music theory works, some of which were also translated into German. In 1894 he received a professorship in music at Trinity College Dublin . He was also a music critic and contributed a number of articles to the first edition of the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians . Prout's edition of the Messiah by George Frideric Handel (1902) was widely used in England.

The compositions by Ebenezer Prout include - in addition to those already mentioned - four symphonies, works for choir and orchestra, an organ sonata, an organ concerto and chamber music.

literature

• Rosemary Williamson:  Prout, Ebenezer. In: Grove Music Online (English; subscription required).

Web links

• Sheet music and audio files by Ebenezer Prout in the International Music Score Library Project