Kenneth Shenton writes:

A COMPOSER, arranger, and conductor, Andrew Carter proved to be one of the most significant figures in English contemporary sacred music.

He first attracted worldwide attention when paraphrasing the words of the Venerable Bede to the simple Lourdes hymn, “Ave Maria”, and cloaking it all with a memorable organ part. The resulting “A Maiden Most Gentle” was heard by millions worldwide when Philip Ledger chose it for the broadcast of the Festival of Lessons and Carols by the choir of King’s College, Cambridge, on Christmas Eve 1978. Two further arrangements quickly followed, “Angelus ad Virginem” and “I Wonder As I Wander”, as did one of his most beguiling original choral works, “Mary’s Magnificat”.

Born in Leicester on 13 December 1939, into a family with a long tradition of tower and handbell ringing, Andrew Roger Carter was the youngest son of Alfred Carter, a machine engineer in the hosiery industry, and his wife, Ada Frances (née Boswell). Educated at Kibworth Beauchamp Grammar School, where, encouraged by the music teacher Terence Dwyer, Carter was soon performing everything from Bach cantatas to Mozart operas, he went on to read music at the University of Leeds, where his tutors were James Brown and Philip Wilby. While in Leeds, he served as Secretary of the Music Society. He also had organ tuition from Donald Hunt, then the Organist of Leeds Parish Church.

Carter began his professional career by spending seven years, from 1962 until 1969, as a bass Songman in the choir of York Minster. At the same time, he taught music at St Mary’s Convent Grammar School. Feeling that the music of the Minster was far too male-orientated, in 1965, he formed the mixed-voice Chapter House Choir. Over the next 17 years, amid numerous broadcasts and recordings, he regularly led them to success in the BBC’s Let the Peoples Sing Competition. Backed by the Churchill Trust, he spent 1981 in Scandinavia, studying Swedish choral music, particularly the work of Eric Ericson. Three years later, he spent 12 months in New Zealand as guest conductor of the Dorian Singers.

Carter’s early publications included a sparkling upper-voice setting of “Tomorrow shall be my dancing day”; a clever conflation of two folksongs for SATB choir, “Two for the Price of One”; and one the most challenging of all his many carols, “Make we merry on this Fest”, dedicated to Francis Jackson, Organist of York.

After a decade in education, Carter turned to composition full-time. His work quickly grew in popularity, and he became one of the most frequently performed and commissioned composers. He was not a radical innovator, but, with an impressive fluency, his choral output displayed a mastery of structural balance, a talent both for word-setting as well as textural imagery, and a most satisfying harmonic richness.

Benedicite, completed in 1989, was the first of several more expansive orchestrated choral offerings, scored for SATB, children’s choir, and orchestra. Horizons, Musick’s Jubilee, Song of Stillness, and an energetic seven-movement Te Deum for solo soprano, SATB, children’s choir, and orchestra followed in quick succession. The last two of these commissions came from the United States, as did the request for the 2000 “Maryland Magnificat”. Three years earlier, Carter had completed a fine Missa Brevis (Missa Sancti Pauli) for the 1997 tercentenary celebrations of St Paul’s Cathedral. Two settings of the evening canticles followed: the first for Wakefield Cathedral, and another to celebrate the Millennium for Southwell.

Also composed that year was a setting of Walt Whitman’s Mystic Trumpeter for two trumpets, organ, and chorus, premièred in Chester Cathedral at the Association of British Choral Directors Annual Convention. No less impressive remains a four-movement Organ Concerto which nestles neatly alongside numerous other organ pieces. These range from a delightful set of Village Variations to a cleverly and precisely imagined Passacaglia and Fugue, completed in 2017 to celebrate Jackson’s 100th birthday.

Andrew Carter died on 5 January, aged 86. His wife, Sylvia, died in 2023. They are survived by their children, Elinor and Martin.