Charles Herbert Kitson

Kitson was born in Leyburn, Yorkshire, and attended school in Ripon. Intending originally to take holy orders, he took his BA (1896) and MA (1904) at Cambridge, where he was organ scholar of Selwyn College. Between those dates, he also took the BMus (1897) and DMus (1902) degrees at Oxford, as an external student. After teaching at Haileybury and St Edmund's School, Canterbury, he became organist of St John the Baptist, Leicester. His first important post was as organist at Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin, in 1913 – a post which he held until 1920 and which he combined with the post of Professor of Theory at the Royal Irish Academy of Music. During his stay in Dublin, he became Professor of Music at University College Dublin between 1916 and 1920, filling temporarily the post of Heinrich Bewerunge (1862–1923). In 1920, he resigned both posts and returned to England, settling in London, where he joined the staff of the Royal College of Music. The same year, he also succeeded Percy Buck as Professor of Music at Trinity College, Dublin – a non-residential post, from which he retired in 1935. Among his notable pupils are Hubert Clifford, Arthur Duff, Arwel Hughes, John F. Larchet, Herbert Sanders, Robert Still, Michael Tippett, and S. Drummond Wolff. He died in Kensington, London, where he was living at 5, Argyll Road, in 1944.

• Shaw, Watkins. "Kitson, Charles Herbert". Grove Music Online (subscription access) • Entry for Kitson at Christ Church Cathedral website • AIM25 entry for Kitson