Recollections of R.J.S. Stevens: An Organist in Gregorian London

by Mark Argent

The career of R DJ S Stevens (1757–1827) lasted from the late baroque to early romanticism. Trained as a choirboy, he was apprenticed at the age of eleven to William Savage, who undertook to instruct him in the "Science of Musick." After leaving Savage, Stevens pursued, somewhat unsuccessfully at first, a career as an organist. In 1782 his luck changed when he was elected an organist to St. Michael’s, Cornhill. He spent the rest of his life earning his living as a composer, organist, and music teacher whose pupils included the illegitimate daughters of Lord Thurlow, the Lord Chancellor. Among Stevens’s works is The Anacreontic Song, which serves as the melody for The Star Spangled Banner.

336 pages, Hardcover

First published September 22, 1992