Samuel Thomas Champnes (died 1803) was the first person to sing "

Heart of Oak "Heart of Oak" is the official march of the Royal Navy. It is also the official march of several Commonwealth navies, including the Royal Canadian Navy and the Royal New Zealand Navy. It was the official march of the Royal Australian Navy, but ...

" in '' Harlequin's Invasion'' at the

Garrick Theatre The Garrick Theatre is a West End theatre, located in Charing Cross Road, in the City of Westminster, named after the stage actor David Garrick. It opened in 1889 with ''The Profligate'', a play by Arthur Wing Pinero, and another Pinero play, ...

in Drury lane. A former Westminster Chorister, probably owing to his maternal grandfather being John Weldon an apprentice to

Purcell Henry Purcell (, rare: ; September 1659 – 21 November 1695) was an English composer of Baroque music, most remembered for his more than 100 songs; a tragic opera, ''Dido and Aeneas''; and his incidental music to a version of Shakespeare's ...

and a Royal Organist at St George's Chapel. (This connection was made using John's will.) Champnes went on to be one of

Handel George Frideric (or Frederick) Handel ( ; baptised , ; 23 February 1685 – 14 April 1759) was a German-British Baroque composer well-known for his operas, oratorios, anthems, concerti grossi, and organ concerti. Born in Halle, Germany, H ...

's soloists. According to Peter Ward Jones, music librarian of the Bodleian Library, "Champness had sung in Handel performances as a boy treble in the 1740s (according to the article on him in the ''Biographical Dictionary of Actors'' ), and Handel had apparently written several arias for the part of the young Benjamin in his oratorio '' Joseph and his Brethren'' for Champness in 1744, and he may well have sung in the choruses of ''

Messiah In Abrahamic religions, a messiah or messias (; , ; , ; ) is a saviour or liberator of a group of people. The concepts of '' mashiach'', messianism, and of a Messianic Age originated in Judaism, and in the Hebrew Bible, in which a ''mashiach ...

'' as a boy."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Champnes, Samuel Thomas Year of birth missing 1803 deaths English male singers Members of the Royal Society of Musicians