Benjamin Cooke

Benjamin Cooke (1734 – 14 September 1793) was an English composer, organist and teacher. Cooke was born in London and named after his father, also Benjamin Cooke (1695/1705 – 1743), a music publisher based in Covent Garden (active from 1726 to 1743), whose production included a seminal edition of the collected works of Arcangelo Corelli in study scores comprising all five books of sonatas and the twelve concerti grossi. From the age of nine, Benjamin Cooke the younger was one of four boy sopranos who sang at performances of the Academy of Ancient Music under the Academy's director Johann Christoph Pepusch (1667–1752), who supervised the boys' education. In due course Cooke became the Academy's librarian, and at the death of Pepusch assumed the leadership of the Academy.