The rise & fall of composer Milton Wellings

Beneath a tree in Locksbrook Cemetery lies a grave whose headstone marks the burial of Milton Wellings, Famous Composer.

Wellings wrote the music for sentimental parlour songs of the kind sung in middle class homes and light music concerts in the later 19th century. He achieved fame and fortune, had an entry in Who’s Who, and it was said that Mr. Wellings’s songs were heard in every drawing room and whistled by every errand boy. Yet if Wellings was so famous, why was the epithet Famous Composer on his headstone necessary?

Stephen Bird MBE FMA will try to answer this question in a talk illustrated with examples of Wellings’ music.