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Herbert Antcliffe

English musicologist, composer and journalist

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionDec 4, 2025
Entity authorityQ113755624
Source-derived summary

Herbert Antcliffe (30 July 1875 – 11 September 1964) was a British musicologist, music critic, teacher and author on musical subjects, who established his career in Sheffield and later moved to The Hague in Holland.

Education

Antcliffe was born in Sheffield, son of Herbert Antcliffe of Eckington, Derbyshire and his wife Cordelia Staniforth (younger sister of the hymn composer Thomas Worsley Staniforth, whose music Antcliffe later edited). Antcliffe attended Sheffield University in its formative years where he first encountered the conductor and composer Henry Coward, who remained a friend.

Organist, teacher and critic

From 1895 he established himself as a music critic for the Sheffield Telegraph. He was also organist at St Matthew's Church, Carver Street, Sheffield Treeton Parish Church and St Wilfrid's Church, Sheffield. As a music tutor in Sheffield he taught piano, organ, singing and music theory from his home at 136 Crookesmoor Road, and later at 102 Cell Street.

Antcliffe left Sheffield in 1915, joining the staff of the Evening Standard in London. He took up an organists position at St Alban's Church, North Finchley. After World War 1 he moved to The Hague, where he lived at 73, van Merlenstraat, to further his long-standing expertise in Dutch music. He was awarded the Queen Wilhelmina Honour for services to Dutch music in 1939.

Editorial summary

“Herbert Antcliffe” enters the record as english musicologist, composer and journalist. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Herbert, Antcliffe and English can confirm, complicate or overturn.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1875, 1964, 1895, 1915—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1875. Its strongest next move is a source search built around Herbert, Antcliffe and English.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

“Herbert Antcliffe” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Herbert, Antcliffe and English provides the most credible route into that argument.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 4, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q113755624. VIAF identifies the subject as 31883301. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1875, 1964, 1895 and 1915.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
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Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Herbert Antcliffe”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Herbert Antcliffe primary sources, Herbert Antcliffe archive and Herbert research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Herbert Antcliffe”?
  2. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Herbert Antcliffe” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.