Henry Edmond Pether (13 November 1867 – 7 February 1932) was an English songwriter and

arranger In music, an arrangement is a musical adaptation of an existing composition. Differences from the original composition may include reharmonization, melodic paraphrasing, orchestration, or formal development. Arranging differs from orchestrat ...

. He was born in

Tottenham Tottenham (, , , ) is a district in north London, England, within the London Borough of Haringey. It is located in the Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county of Greater London. Tottenham is centred north-northeast of Charing Cross, ...

, London, and worked for many years as an employee of the music publishers, Francis, Day & Hunter, primarily as an arranger of songs, including traditional

folk song Folk music is a music genre that includes #Traditional folk music, traditional folk music and the Contemporary folk music, contemporary genre that evolved from the former during the 20th-century folk revival. Some types of folk music may be ca ...

s and shanties, for publication as

sheet music Sheet music is a handwritten or printed form of musical notation that uses musical symbols to indicate the pitches, rhythms, or chords of a song or instrumental musical piece. Like its analogs – printed Book, books or Pamphlet, pamphlets ...

.Peter Gammond, ''The Oxford Companion to Popular Music'', Oxford University Press, 1991, p.450Philip L. Scowcroft, "A 120th Garland of British Light Music Composers", ''Classical Music Web''
Retrieved 22 January 2021 As a writer, his most successful songs included "

Waiting at the Church "Waiting at the Church" is a popular comedic British music hall song written by Fred W. Leigh (words) and Henry E. Pether (music) for Vesta Victoria, and copyrighted in 1906. It is sung by a bride-to-be who has given her fiancé, Obadiah Bi ...

" and "Poor John" (both with lyrics by Fred W. Leigh, sung by

Vesta Victoria Vesta Victoria (born Victoria Lawrence, 26 November 1873 – 7 April 1951) was an English music hall singer and comedian. She was famous for her performances of songs such as "Waiting at the Church" and " Daddy Wouldn't Buy Me a Bow Wow", both ...

, 1906); and "The Seaside Posters Round the Home" (lyrics by Edgar Bateman, performed by

Ernest Hastings Ernest Walter Hastings (15 June 1879 – 2 September 1940) was an English singer, pianist, composer and performer of comic monologues. He was popular from the 1900s to the 1930s, when he was described as "England's Greatest Entertainer at the ...

, 1919). He also produced orchestral arrangements for

revue A revue is a type of multi-act popular theatre, theatrical entertainment that combines music, dance, and sketch comedy, sketches. The revue has its roots in 19th century popular entertainment and melodrama but grew into a substantial cultural pre ...

s, including ''The Ragtime Revue'' (1912), and ''

The Co-Optimists ''The Co-Optimists'' was a stage variety revue that opened in London on 27 June 1921. The show was devised by Davy Burnaby. The piece was a co-operative venture by what ''The Times'' called "a group of well-known musical comedy and variety arti ...

'' (1921). Together with

Bennett Scott Bennett Scott (12 October 1871 – 1 June 1930)Richard Anthony Baker, ''British Music Hall: an illustrated history'', Pen & Sword, 2014, , pp.154-156 was an English writer of music hall songs. Born in London, of Jewish background, he started wo ...

, Worton David and others, Pether was one of the founders of the

Performing Right Society PRS for Music Limited (formerly The MCPS-PRS Alliance Limited) is a British music copyright collective, made up of two collection societies: the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society (MCPS) and the Performing Right Society (PRS). It undertakes ...

, to ensure the fair distribution of

copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive legal right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, ...

payments to songwriters.Richard Anthony Baker, ''British Music Hall: an illustrated history'', Pen & Sword, 2014, , pp.139, 156 He died in

Palmers Green Palmers Green is a suburban area and electoral ward in north London, England, within the London Borough of Enfield. It is located within the N13 postcode district, around north of Charing Cross. It is home to the largest population of Greek Cy ...

, London in 1932, aged 64.

References

External links

*
Compositions
at ''Database of Popular Music'' 1867 births 1932 deaths English male songwriters People from Tottenham {{songwriter-stub