Michael Arne

Who was Michael Arne?

Michael Arne was an English composer, harpsichordist, organist, singer, and actor. He was the son of the composer Thomas Arne and the soprano Cecilia Young, a member of the famous Young family of musicians of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Like his father, Arne worked primarily as a composer of stage music and vocal art song, contributing little to other genres of music. He wrote several songs for London's pleasure gardens, the most famous of which is Lass with the Delicate Air. A moderately prolific composer, Arne wrote nine operas and collaborated on at least 15 others. His most successful opera, Cymon, enjoyed several revivals during his lifetime and into the early nineteenth century.