Samuel Wesley

(1766–1837)

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Samuel Wesley was the younger son of the divine and hymn-writer Charles Wesley (1707– 1788), ‘the sweet singer of Methodism’, and a nephew of John Wesley, the evangelist and leader of Methodism (1703 –1791). He was born in Bristol on 24 February 1766. Like his brother Charles (1757–1834), whom he later affectionately described as ‘an obstinate Handelian’, he was a musical prodigy: when he was six he started taking harpsichord lessons, and a year later was accompanying psalms at St James’s Church under the watchful eye of its organist, Edmund Broderip. He also studied the violin with Wilhelm Cramer. In 1774 Dr William Boyce visited the Wesleys and said to the father, ‘Sir, I hear you have got an English Mozart in your house. Young [Thomas] Linley tells me wonderful things of him’; and was amazed when Sam presented him with the score of his recently completed oratorio Ruth. In 1778 a set of harpsichord sonatas appeared in print as Samuel’s Op. 1.

Despite his Methodist background, Samuel was strongly attracted to the music of the Roman Catholic Church and made many settings of Latin sacred texts; he once declared: ‘If the Roman Doctrines were like the Roman Music we should have Heaven on Earth’. Nevertheless, he became a Freemason in 1788 and in 1793 was married according to the rites of the Church of England. The marriage broke down after a few years although it produced three children.

Although he held no important salaried position Samuel was acknowledged as the finest English organist of his day. In 1837 he heard the young Felix Mendelssohn playing the organ in Christ Church, Newgate Street and when Mendelssohn pressed him to play, Wesley exclaimed, ‘Oh, Sir, you have not
heard me play; you should have heard me forty years ago!’. He was also a central figure in the revival of interest in England of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach (‘The Man’ or ‘our Demi-God’, as Wesley described him) and assisted in the publication of a scholarly edition of Das wohltemperierte Clavier in 1810 –12. He died on 11 October 1837 and was buried beside his parents and brother in the graveyard of the little old parish church of St Marylebone in Marylebone High Street; their tombstone now stands in the memorial garden marking the site of the church, which was demolished in 1949 – a stone’s throw from the building which, since 1911, has been the home of the Royal Academy of Music.

Wesley’s instrumental compositions include a large body of music for organ and for piano, chamber music and works for orchestra, including a dozen concertos (for violin, harpsichord, and organ), several overtures and six symphonies, the first five of which were composed for the Marylebone concerts.

from notes by Robin Golding