Wilfred Brown

Wilfred Brown was an accomplished English tenor.
He was born in Horsham, Sussex and educated first at Collyer's School, then at Christ's Hospital School, Horsham before winning a scholarship in 1939 to Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge. Brown was a lifelong member of the Religious Society of Friends. After war-time service with the Friends Relief Service he returned to Cambridge and graduated in 1947. He then moved to University College School, Hampstead where he taught German and French. He left two years later to teach at Bedales School, where he was form master of amongst others Gerald Finzi's two sons before becoming a full-time singer in 1951.
Like fellow Petersfield resident Michael John Hurd, he championed the work of Gerald Finzi, who was a friend. He first sang Finzi's Dies natalis in 1952 under the composer's baton, and was to become Finzi's favoured soloist in several subsequent performances of the work. Brown also gave the first performance of Till Earth Outwears, a posthumous collection of Finzi's settings of poems by Thomas Hardy, in 1957 at Ashmansworth.