Harold Fraser-Simson
Harold Fraser-Simson (15 August 1872 – 19 January 1944) was an English composer of light music, including songs and the scores to musical comedies. His most famous musical was the World War I hit The Maid of the Mountains, and he later set numerous children's poems to music, especially those of A. A. Milne. Life and career Fraser-Simson was born in London, the second child and eldest son of an East Indies merchant, Arthur Theodore Simson and his wife, Jane Anne Catherine née Fraser, of Reelig, Scotland. He was educated at Charterhouse School, then at Dulwich College, then at King's College London and in France. As a young man he joined a ship-owning firm in London before turning to music as a full-time occupation in his early forties. Musical comedies Fraser-Simson published his first song, "My Sweet Sweeting", in 1907. His first theatre score was for the 1911 musical Bonita, with a libretto by Walter Wadham Peacock, which played at Queen's Theatre. Fraser-Simson's biggest success was the score for the operetta The Maid of the Mountains, which played at Daly's Theatre in London in 1917 and finally closed after 1,352 performances. This was, at the time, a phenomenal run second