3-077-997 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The late Mr. John Barnett, musical composer, 1890. '...Barnett displayed great aptitude for music at a very early age, having possessed much merit as a boy vocalist. He soon turned his attention to composition, and produced, while yet in his youth, some important pieces. His first stage-production was a musical farce at the Lyceum Theatre (in 1825)...His chief success, however, was the opera of "The Mountain Sylph"...Other operatic works by Barnett were his "Fair Rosamund" (1837) and "Farinelli" (1838)...Among many unpublished compositions left by the deceased composer is the score of "Kathleen," an opera on an Irish subject...Several collections of songs by Barnett - notably his "Lyrical Illustrations of the Modern Poets" - are replete with charm of style and expression...Barnett, when young, wrote a symphony and quartets, which remain unpublished; and he also composed religious music, among which is an oratorio, "The Omnipresence of the Deity." It is to be hoped that some atonement will be made for the neglect with which Barnett's music has long been treated. In 1837 John Barnett married a daughter of Bindley, the eminent violoncellist, and during many past years the composer had been settled at Cheltenham as a teacher of the vocal art'. From "Illustrated London News", 1890.