Dictionary of National Biography, 1927 supplement/Wooldridge, Harry Ellis
WOOLDRIDGE, HARRY ELLIS (1845–1917), painter, musician, and critic, had a wide personal influence on the educated taste of his time. Born 28 March 1845, his father, who held a literary post in Smith, Elder's house, articled him to Lloyd's, but he soon changed his office-desk for an easel in the Royal Academy School. Friendship with Burne-Jones encouraged his pre-Raphaelite sympathies; his Academy pictures were always well hung, the first being bought by Sir F. Leighton; and a cabinet which he decorated for some upholsterer was placed in the South Kensington Museum. Critical sensibility gradually checked his creativeness, and he undertook commissions—from G. F. Watts, Sir T. G. Jackson, and others—to execute wall-paintings or design stained glass. Of this period are his large reredos at St. Martin's church, Brighton, and many of Messrs. Powell's windows, worked in Renaissance manner with correct drawing and predetermined colours. But he had another love, smiling perhaps more kindly upon him, and his daily recreation was to explore the old Italian music in the British Museum. From his youth an accomplished singer, he now became an expert contrapuntist, and as an unrivalled specialist was chosen to re-edit Chappell's Popular Music of the Olden Time, under the new title Old English Popular Music; the first volume (1893) is an example of his scholarship. Sir Hubert Parry used to consult him, and Sir John Stainer invited him to lecture for his chair. But he was recalled to painting by being appointed Slade professor of fine art at Oxford in 1895. There, with his honorary M.A. degree, he personated academic propriety, teaching logical principles in rounded periods of Caroline diction and rhythm.
Reviewing inaugurally the theory of art from Plato to Hegel, he proclaimed the Greek notions to be inadequate, and, accepting much of Hegel's analysis, alleged this to be philosophically one-eyed, through ignorance of actual experience; objecting also that it encouraged a literary criticism which, in ascribing development of art to moral causes and political events, neglected the predominant influence of new materials or methods; and it was these, he contended, and the personal delight of artists within their own circle, exploiting new means of expression, that provoked the developments of any art. This thesis, which he would have applied with even greater confidence and could have illustrated by more convincing detail in music, was maintained throughout his discourses. He was twice re-elected, retiring in 1904.
While at this work he was retained to contribute the initial volume to The Oxford History of Music; and, judging that in such a work the art should be traced to its Greek foundations, he was led off into obscure antiquarian research; and although experts say of his two volumes (vol. i, 1901 and vol. ii, 1905) that ‘they are monuments of erudition and insight … unlikely to be superseded … and his explanations of controverted points though challenged at the time have won general acceptance’, yet, since he had exceeded the limits of his space before he arrived at the period of his special knowledge, he left undone the one great work for which he was exclusively qualified. Under this double strain his health failed; and he became more and more invalided until his death, which took place in London 13 February 1917.
Except some late photographs, a silhouette, and a sketch by Mr. Roger Fry, there is no portrait of Wooldridge. He had a well-formed thick-set frame, massive bust, and noble head which early baldness forced on the attention; blue eyes in wide orbits, fine and muscular features, ruddy auburn beard trimmed like a Frenchman's. In dress and manners punctilious, in character brave and generous, of philosophical conviction and strict morality, he was gentle-hearted and indulgent towards others, genial in conventional chatter but intolerant of pretence, especially in the talk of artists, to whom his undisguised amusement and devastating irony were obnoxious. With but a smattering of Latin and Greek, his rare intuition, wide reading, and full memory distinguished him in any company. He had a good knowledge of French literature and was a fair Italian scholar, pronouncing both languages like a native; was a good raconteur and mimic, and a loud laugher. Although he truly loved romance, his solid figure, deliberate movements, and searching common sense seemed unromantic, and gave the impression of ease and indolence—and that was not untrue to his nature, for he would have preferred a world that was not always calling for the delicate adjustment of his serious intelligence.
Among his musical remains are The Yattendon Hymnal, 1895–1899, edited with the present poet laureate, his lifelong friend, with whom he lived for years in London and afterwards constantly visited at Yattendon, where he sang in the choir and set music for it. There are also church settings and compositions by him in Musica Antiquata (1907–1908, 1913). The rare combination of delicate aesthetic sensibility with complete scholarly and artistic sympathy identifies the best of these simple four-part polyphonic settings with the workmanship of the original masters. He was called upon to serve on the committee for the revision of Hymns Ancient and Modern, but retired after two or three meetings through dissatisfaction with the quality of the work.
He married in 1894 Julia Mary, daughter of Stephen Olding. To her knowledge of German he owed much in his antiquarian research. He left no children.
[Personal knowledge.]