Cummings, W(illiam) H(ayman) (1831–1915)

English organist, tenor, and scholar. He sang under Felix Mendelssohn's direction as a boy and later made an edition of ‘Hark! the Herald Angels Sing’ to music from Mendelssohn's Festgesang. He sang in Johann Sebastian Bach's Passions and conducted the Sacred Harmonic Society; co-founded the Purcell Society and edited three volumes for it; and wrote a biography of Henry Purcell (1881). He also wrote on John Blow, Thomas Arne, and Handel (biography, 1904). He was principal of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama 1896–1910.