Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 25.djvu/69

 sex). On the introduction of the quadrille at Almack's by Lady Jersey after 1815 (, iii. 55), Hart, who was described as teacher and pianist at private balls, began his long series of adaptations of national and operatic airs to the fashionable dance measures. His most notable achievement was the compilation in 1819 of the tunes of the Original Lancers, which are still popular (ib. ii. 89). From 1818 to 1821 Hart was chorus-master and pianist at the English opera (Lyceum), and wrote the songs for ‘Amateurs and Actors,’ 1818, ‘The Bull's Head,’ ‘A Walk for a Wager,’ 1819, ‘The Vampyre,’ 1820, and other musical farces and melodramas. From 1829 until his death Hart lived at Hastings, where he opened a musicseller's shop, conducted a small band, and played the organ at St. Mary's Chapel. He died on 10 Dec. 1844 at Hastings, aged 50.

Some of Hart's most successful quadrilles were based on the music of ‘Don Giovanni,’ 1818, ‘Les Lanciers,’ 1819, ‘Les Hussars,’ Locke's ‘Macbeth,’ ‘Pietro l'Eremita,’ 1822, English melodies, ‘Donna del Lago,’ 1823, ‘Der Freischütz,’ 1824, Irish melodies, and Scotch melodies. He composed forty-eight sets in all. He was also the author of some waltzes and royal gallopades. ‘An Easy Mode of Teaching Thorough Bass and Composition’ is ascribed to him. 

HART, PHILIP (d. 1749), organist and musical composer, was son of James Hart (1647–1718), a gentleman of the Chapel Royal, and chorister of Westminster Abbey, many of whose songs appear in Playford's ‘Collections’ from 1676 to 1692, and who was buried in Westminster Abbey on 5 May 1718. The son Philip was for upwards of fifty years organist of St. Andrew Undershaft and of St. Michael's, Cornhill. He resigned his appointment at St. Michael's, and on 28 May 1724 was elected the first organist of St. Dionis Backchurch. He died on 17 July 1749, at an advanced age, and after a long illness. By his will (dated 13 Oct. 1747, which was witnessed by John Byfield, apparently the organ-builder), he bequeathed his property to his nephew William, son of his brother, George Hart (a member of the Chapel Royal, 1694). Hart is said by Hawkins to have been a sound musician, but to have ‘entertained little relish’ for innovations. Hawkins also describes Hart's frequent use of the ‘shake’ in playing, and records how he was wont to discourse music at Britton's in the company of Handel, Pepusch, Woollaston, and others. As a composer, Hart was no more than respectable. His setting of Hughes's ‘Ode in Praise of Musick’ was performed on St. Cecilia's day, 1703, and published in 4to. The manuscript score, entitled ‘An Ode to Harmony,’ is now in the British Museum. Hart edited about 1720 in 8vo, ‘Melodies proper to be sung to … ye Psalms of David,’ and published music to ‘The Morning Hymn’ (from ‘Paradise Lost’) in 1729, 4to. His other compositions were: Some of Hart's music is in a manuscript collection of ‘Suites for the Harpsichord,’ Addit. MS. 31465 (British Museum). .
 * 1) ‘Fugues for the Organ and Harpsichord,’ an early work.
 * 2) Anthems: ‘I will give thanks,’ and ‘Praise the Lord, ye Servants,’ in vol. v. of the Tudway Collection (Harleian MS. 7341).
 * 3) Many songs, including a ‘Song upon the Safe Return of His Majesty King William,’ written about 1700, and ‘Sound the Trumpet,’ which was written to celebrate the nuptials of the Prince of Orange and the Princess Royal, 1734, and others, like ‘Ye curious Winds,’ in Handelian style.

HART, SOLOMON ALEXANDER (1806–1881), painter, was born at Plymouth in April 1806. He was of the Jewish race and religion. His father was Samuel Hart of Plymouth, who began life as a worker in silver and gold at Bath; he is mentioned by Bromley (Catalogue of Engraved British Portraits, 1793) as a mezzotint engraver, and studied painting under Northcote in London in 1785.

Young Hart was educated under the Rev. Israel Worsley, a unitarian minister. Father and son went to London in 1820; the former taught Hebrew and the latter prepared drawings to become a student at the Royal Academy, where he was admitted in August 1823. To gain his living and help to support his father he coloured theatrical prints and painted a few miniatures. He commenced exhibiting at Somerset House with a miniature of his father in 1826. His first oil painting, ‘Instruction,’ was shown two years later at the British Institution, and was sold at the private view. Next year he was an exhibitor of five pictures, but did not sell one. In 1830 he exhibited at the Society of British Artists in Suffolk Street a more ambitious work called ‘Interior of a Polish Synagogue,’ afterwards known as ‘The Elevation of the Law’ (engraved in the Art Journal, 1851). This was purchased by Robert Vernon and bequeathed