Parker, Handel

Composer

b Oxenhope, nr Haworth, W Yorks 1854, d Shipley, Yorks 1928. Born into an extensive musical family, of parents who named their children after composers including Haydn and Jubal. He played the flute in the local drum and fife band at the age of 7, and was also proficient on the violin, trombone and organ. He was organist at Oxenhope churches (the Hawksbridge Baptist Ch at 10, the parish ch at 14), and after 5 years in the textile industry he became a full-time musician before he turned 21. He worked with various Yorks brass bands, and was organist and choirmaster at other churches in the county before settling for some years at Nassau Cathedral in the Bahamas. 16 tunes and a fourfold Amen were published posthumously in 1928 in The Deep Harmony Hymnary, the title indicating the tune for which he is best known, both in the UK and the USA. No.231.