Thomas Moore

From Wind Repertory Project
Thomas Moore

Thomas Moore (28 May 1779, Dublin, Ire. – 25 February 1852, Wiltshire, Eng.) was an Irish poet, singer, songwriter, and entertainer.

From a relatively early age Moore showed an interest in music and other performing arts. He sometimes appeared in musical plays with his friends, and at one point had ambitions to become an actor. Moore attended several Dublin schools including Samuel Whyte's English Grammar School in Grafton Street where he learned the English accent with which he spoke for the rest of his life. In 1795 he graduated from Trinity College. His time at Trinity came amidst the ongoing turmoil following the French Revolution, and a number of his fellow students such as Robert Emmet were supporters of the United Irishmen movement. Besides Emmet, another formative influence was Edward Hudson, also a fellow student at Trinity College, who played a crucial role in introducing Moore to Edward Bunting's A General Collection of the Ancient Irish Music (1797), later one of the main sources of his own collection of Irish Melodies.

In the early years of his career, Moore's work was largely generic and had he died at this point he would likely not have been considered an Irish poet. From 1806 to 1807 Moore dramatically changed his style of writing and focus. Following a request by the publishers James and William Power, he wrote lyrics to a series of Irish tunes in the manner of Haydn's settings of British folksongs, with Sir John Andrew Stevenson as arranger of the music. They were originally published in ten volumes and a supplement between 1808 and 1834, the musical arrangements of the last volumes after Stevenson's death (1833) being done by Henry Bishop.

Moore became best known for these Irish Melodies, which were enormously popular, containing songs such as The Minstrel Boy, The Last Rose of Summer, Believe Me If All Those Endearing Young Charms and Oft in the Stilly Night. Moore is often considered Ireland's national bard and is to Ireland what Robert Burns is to Scotland.


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