John Goss

GOSS, (Sir) John. b. Fareham, Hampshire, 27 December 1800; d. London, 10 May 1880. His father, Joseph Goss, was organist at Fareham. He was a chorister at the Chapel Royal from 1811 under John Stafford Smith (1750–1836), who perhaps inculcated in him a reverence for old music; later he studied composition with Thomas Attwood*. As organist of the new parish church of St Luke, Chelsea (1824–38) Goss brought out a four-volume collection, Parochial Psalmody (1826). He composed one successful opera, The Serjeant’s Wife (1827), as well as a number of glees, but devoted his life chiefly to the performance and composition of church music. In a field marked by a good deal of rivalry he maintained a...