Samuel Sebastian Wesley was a towering figure in the history of English cathedral music. No other composer between Purcell and Stanford came close to his achievement. He was a son of Samuel Wesley, another important composer of sacred music, and a grandson of Charles Wesley, the great hymn writer and one of the founders of Methodism. He was a chorister at the Chapel Royal, though no doubt he gained much of his musical knowledge and skill from his father. He certainly inherited or acquired Samuel’s mastery of counterpoint, harmony, and the organ, his respect for older styles (especially that of J. S. Bach), and his independence of spirit. To these qualities he added some kinship with the Continental composers of his own time, a passionately romantic temperament, and a genius for the dramatization of biblical words.
Although Wesley tried his hand at many kinds of music both sacred and secular, in the end he devoted his main creative efforts to music for Anglican church choirs, which also provided his steadiest source of income. Between 1832 and his death he was organist at four different cathedrals, with an interlude at Leeds Parish Church, where there was an efficient and well-endowed choir.
