Handel Parker

PARKER, Handel. b. Oxenhope, Yorkshire, 29 January 1854; d. Shipley, Yorkshire, 30 January 1928. He came from a musical family in which the children were named after famous composers. Handel was a versatile and precocious musician, who played the flute in the village band at the age of seven, and who was organist at Oxenhope Baptist Church at the age of ten. He became organist of the parish church in 1868. In addition to the flute and organ, he also played the violin and trombone, and conducted the Haworth Band for fifty years. Sixteen of his hymn tunes (together with a fourfold ‘Amen’) were collected after his death and published locally, with the title The Deep Harmony Hymnary (Colne:...