William Shakespeare (tenor)

In 1866 he won a King's Scholarship to study at the Royal Academy of Music, London, with William Sterndale Bennett.

Awarded the Mendelssohn Scholarship in 1871, he traveled to Leipzig to study with composer, pianist, conductor, and pedagogue Carl Reinecke, but soon left Leipzig for Milan, to study under the guidance of the singing teacher Francesco Lamperti.

He appeared in England once again as a tenor in 1875 where he sang at the Monday Popular Concerts at the Crystal Palace and the 1877 Leeds Festival.

He was appointed as a Professor of Singing at the Royal Academy of Music in 1878 and Conductor of the Concerts in 1880, resigning the latter post in 1886.

Shakespeare composed few works, but his Piano Concerto was heard at the 1879 Brighton Festival, where The Musical Times outlined his singing career and judged that In addition to singing, teaching and composition, William Shakespeare wrote and published several books.