Harold Darke

Millions know the music of Harold Darke, if not his name, thanks to “In the Bleak Midwinter,” one of the best-loved of all Christmas carols. His mellifluous setting of Christina Rosetti’s seasonal verse was written in 1911 for the choir of Emmanuel Church in West Hampstead, London; during the Second World War it was adopted by the Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, after Darke deputized for its music director, Boris Ord, who was on active service. The carol became a fixture in the annual Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols at King’s, broadcast via radio to a vast global audience and taken up by choirs around the world. Born in London in 1888, Darke served as organist of St. Michael’s, Cornhill, at the heart of the City of London, from 1916 to 1966 and almost as long as conductor of the St. Michael’s Singers, which he founded in 1919. Darke was renowned for his Monday lunchtime organ recitals at St. Michael’s, a boon to office clerks and day-trippers to London, and as the composer of works for the Anglican liturgy, three Communion services and an uplifting “Te Deum & Jubilate in F Major” impressive among them.