Early Life and Influences
Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, Henderson moved to Nottingham, England, at an early age when his Scottish father, a prominent Congregational minister, was appointed to a church there and later became Principal of Paton College in that city. He was educated at Nottingham High School, where he became captain of cricket. He sang in his father's church choir (his first solo was as First Malefactor in Stainer's The Crucifixion), and in school concerts, but was mainly active in sports. Henderson served in the First World War in the Artists Rifles. In the regimental concert party were other well-known baritones, including Charles James Mott, Percy Heming and Clay Thomas. Henderson was deeply impressed by Mott, who was later killed in the war.
Read more about this topic: Roy Henderson (baritone)
Famous quotes containing the words early, life and/or influences:
“It was common practice for me to take my children with me whenever I went shopping, out for a walk in a white neighborhood, or just felt like going about in a white world. The reason was simple enough: if a black man is alone or with other black men, he is a threat to whites. But if he is with children, then he is harmless, adorable.”
—Gerald Early (20th century)
“The power to guess the unseen from the seen, to trace the implications of things, to judge the whole piece by the pattern, the condition of feeling life in general so completely that you are well on your way to knowing any particular corner of it—this cluster of gifts may almost be said to constitute experience.”
—Henry James (1843–1916)
“The tourist who moves about to see and hear and open himself to all the influences of the places which condense centuries of human greatness is only a man in search of excellence.”
—Max Lerner (b. 1902)