{{Short description|British conductor (1849–1944)}} {{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}} thumb|right|Sir Henry Coward '''Sir Henry Coward''' (26 November 1849{{spaced ndash}}10 June 1944) was a British conductor and composer.
Born in Liverpool to parents in the entertainment industry, Coward took an apprenticeship to a cutler in Sheffield. Educating himself, he became a teacher and soon a headteacher.<ref name="odnb">"Coward, Henry", ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography''</ref>
Coward's interest in music developed from a tonic sol-fa class, and in 1876 he founded the Sheffield Tonic Sol-fa Association. This was renamed the Sheffield Musical Union, and Coward was its director until 1933.<ref name="odnb" /> His choral legacy is still visible in Sheffield, following Sheffield Music Union's 1937 merger with the Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus, a choir which still performs to this day.<ref name="sheffieldphil.org">{{Cite web |url=https://sheffieldphil.org/ |title=Sheffield Philharmonic Chorus – South Yorkshire's foremost large mixed-voice choir |website=Sheffieldphil.org |accessdate=29 July 2020}}</ref>
In 1889, Coward obtained a B.Mus. degree at the University of Oxford, and in 1894, became a Doctor of Music. He returned to Sheffield, where he became the chorus master of the Sheffield Music Festival. He conducted societies in Leeds, Huddersfield, Newcastle and Glasgow, and toured worldwide with the Sheffield Choir. He also taught music at Sheffield Training College and lectured at the University of Sheffield.<ref name="odnb" />
In 1897, having established a reputation for conducting large numbers of singers in Sheffield parks, he was invited to oversee a gathering of 60,000 school-children in Norfolk Park in Sheffield, to entertain Queen Victoria.<ref>{{Cite book |url=http://archive.org/details/drhenrycowardpio00rodgiala |title=Dr. Henry Coward, the pioneer chorus-master|first=J. A. |last=Rodgers |date=29 July 1911 |page=19 |location=London |publisher=John Lane |accessdate=29 July 2020 |via=Archive.org}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal |url=http://www.oldedwardians.org.uk/nlc/mags/48March.html#victoria |title=Looking Backward, S.R.G.S., 1885-1905 |author=P. J. W. |date=March 1948 |journal=King Edward VII School Magazine |volume=XII |number=5 |pages=103–108 |via=Oldedwardians.org.uk |accessdate=29 July 2020}}</ref>
Dan Godfrey wrote that "it is doubtful whether England has ever produced a better or more gifted choir trainer than Coward... He has evolved, formulated and put into practice a method of choral technique which has had the result of bringing about a revival of singing in chorus which has spread through the whole Empire."<ref>{{cite book |first=Jeffrey |last=Richards |author-link=Jeffrey Richards |date=2002 |title=Imperialism and Music: Britain 1876–1953 |publisher=Manchester University Press |isbn=978-0-719061431}}</ref>
After World War I, Henry Coward faced criticism for being unable to conduct an orchestra, but was knighted in 1926 and, from 1929 to 1944, served as President of the Tonic Sol-fa College in London.<ref name="odnb" />
A Blue plaque at 6 Kenwood Road, Nether Edge In Sheffield where he lived between 1931 and 1944.
Coward campaigned against jazz,<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/HAWST19270921.2.34 |title=Jazz Denounced |newspaper=Hawera Star |volume=XLVII |date=21 September 1927 |page=7 |access-date=2021-07-23 |via=Papers Past}}</ref> describing it as "atavistic, lowering, degrading and a racial question ... composed of ... unquestionably grotesque forms."<ref>{{cite book |first=Neil |last=Powell |date=1997 |title=The Language of Jazz |location=Manchester |publisher=Carcanet Press |isbn=978-1-857541649}}</ref>
Coward was an active Freemason being initiated in Furnival Lodge No.2558 Sheffield in 1896 and becoming a founding member of University Lodge No.3911 Sheffield in 1919.
Sir Henry Coward died in 1944, aged 94.<ref name="BNLObit">{{cite news |title=Obituary: Sir Henry Coward |work=Belfast News-Letter |date=12 June 1944 |via=British Newspaper Archive |quote=Sir Henry Coward, the choirmaster who once toured the world with the Sheffield Choir, died in Sheffield on Saturday night, aged 94.|page=4}}</ref>
==Works== * ''Choral Technique and Interpretation''<ref>{{Cite book |url=|title=Choral Technique and Interpretation |first=Henry |last=Coward |date=1914 |location=London |publisher=Novello & Co |via= |access-date= |archive-date=|archive-url= |url-status=}}</ref> (1914)
==References== {{Reflist}}
==External links== * {{commonscatinline}} * {{IMSLP|id=Coward, Henry}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Coward, Henry}} Category:1849 births Category:1944 deaths Category:Academics of the University of Sheffield Category:Alumni of the University of Oxford Category:English conductors (music) Category:British male conductors (music) Category:Musicians from Liverpool Category:Knights Bachelor Category:Conductors (music) awarded knighthoods Category:Schoolteachers from Yorkshire