John Weldon

In the early 1690s, John Walter, the organist at Eton College, provided Chichester-born John Weldon with his musical education.

In 1695, somebody set Shakespeare’s play, The Tempest, to newly-composed music. The identity of this composer is a matter of continuing controversy. The more traditional attribution was to Henry Purcell. More recently, though, the weight of authority has favored John Weldon. If the latter, it was a high-profile way to inaugurate a musical career.

In 1701, Weldon won a competition to compose the music for a Masque “The Judgment of Paris,” with a libretto by William Congreve. Soon thereafter he was appointed Gentleman Extraordinary of the Chapel Royal, and became organist at St. Bride’s Church in Fleet Street, London.

After 1704, Weldon devoted himself chiefly to church music, increasingly caught up in his duties in those two posts.

In 1716, a collection of his Church music was published under the title “Divine Harmonies.”