Introduction

Biography

Richard was the oldest son of Thomas Terry of New­cas­tle up­on Tyne, and hus­band of Ma­ry Lee (mar­ried 1909).

An or­gan­ist, choir di­rect­or and mu­si­co­lo­gist, his first ap­poin­tments were to El­stow School in 1890 and as or­gan­ist and choir­mas­ter of St. John’s Ca­thed­ral, An­ti­gua, in 1892.

In 1896 he be­came or­gan­ist and mu­sic di­rect­or at the Ro­man Ca­tho­lic Be­ne­dic­tine Down­side School in So­mer­set. It was there he be­gan re­viv­ing the La­tin mu­sic of Tu­dor Eng­lish com­pos­ers such as Will­iam Byrd and Tho­mas Tall­is.

He was great­ly in­spired by the re­viv­al of Gre­gor­ian chant by Dom Pros­per Guer­an­ger at So­lesmes Ab­bey in France, which was to be an im­port­ant part of the Down­side mu­sic­al re­per­toire.

Terry was the first Di­rect­or of Mu­sic at the new­ly built West­min­ster Ca­thed­ral, a post he held 1901–24. He re­signed af­ter com­ing un­der sig­ni­fi­cant cri­ti­cism for his choice of mu­sic.

Nonetheless, dur­ing this time he es­tab­lished a sig­ni­fi­cant cho­ral tra­di­tion at the ca­thed­ral, de­vel­op­ing a re­per­toire of both Gre­gor­ian chant and po­ly­pho­nic mu­sic.

The choir’s par­ti­cu­lar fo­cus on re­nais­sance po­ly­pho­ny is be­lieved to have had an im­pact on the emerg­ing school of 20th Cen­tu­ry Eng­lish com­pos­ers and on the per­form­ance of church mu­sic in Eng­land.

After his re­sig­na­tion from West­min­ster Ca­thed­ral, he went on to work as a mu­sic­al ed­it­or, jour­nal­ist and aca­dem­ic. He was the first ed­ito­r of the Ox­ford Uni­ver­si­ty Press ser­ies Tu­dor Church Mu­sic, though by the time the ser­ies was com­plet­ed, he had been oust­ed as ed­it­or.

Terry was knight­ed in the 1922 Dis­so­lu­tion Hon­ours List.

Works

• Old Christ­mas Car­ols (Lon­don: Burns, Oates & Wash­bourne, 1923)