Leslie Stuart

Leslie Stuart (15 March 1863 – 27 March 1928) born Thomas Augustine Barrett was an English composer of Edwardian musical comedy, best known for the hit show Florodora (1899) and many popular songs. He began in Manchester as a church organist, for 14 years, and taught music while beginning to compose church music and secular songs in the late 1870s. In the 1880s, he began to promote and conduct orchestral and vocal concerts of popular and theatre music as "Mr. T. A. Barrett's Concerts". He began to focus his composition on music hall, including songs for blackface performers, such as "Lily of Laguna"; songs for musical theatre, such as pantomimes and London shows touring through Manchester; and ballads such as "Soldiers of the King". Stuart later campaigned against the interpolation of new songs into musical theatre scores and for better enforcement of musical copyrights. In 1895, Stuart began to write songs for George Edwardes's London shows at the Gaiety Theatre and Daly's Theatre. His first full musical comedy score was Florodora in 1899. The show became an international hit, and its song "Tell me, pretty maiden", became a vaudeville standard. Other musical comedy successes followed, including The School Girl (1903), The Belle of Mayfair (1906) and Havana (1908). Of his later shows, only Peggy made much of an impact. By 1911, Stuart's gambling debts sent him into bankruptcy. Unable to adapt to changing musical tastes, he was no longer in demand as a composer, although he had some success as a piano sketch artist in variety theatre.