Gwyn Arch

Arch was born in Southampton on 5 April 1931, to a Welsh father.[1] He was raised in Birmingham and then Ipswich, where he attended secondary school.[1] After national service he studied English at Selwyn College, University of Cambridge.[2][3] He played in jazz bands there and at University of Oxford,[3] where he took a postgraduate diploma in education.[2]

Arch taught English at Rickmansworth Grammar School for nine years, studying musical composition at Trinity College London in his spare time.[3] He was Director of Music at Bulmershe College from 1964 to 1985.[4][5] In the 1960s he arranged music for BBC Home Service radio programmes for schools, and in the 1970s, he made several appearances, as a conductor, on the BBC Television programme Seeing and Believing.[6]

He was musical director of the South Chiltern Choral Society for almost 50 years, retiring in 2014.[7] In 1971 he established the Reading Male Voice Choir and served as the choir's musical director until 2015.[5] He was a Licentiate of the Royal Academy of Music, a Composition Fellow of Trinity College London, and for ten years an Associated Board examiner.[5] His oeuvre includes many choral works and songs, arranged for mixed and male choirs.[5] He marketed his arrangements for male choirs, as sheet music via his company Grove Music.[lower-alpha 1][8]

Arch was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2006 Birthday Honours, for services to music in Berkshire.[5][9]

Arch met Jane, subsequently a head teacher, when he was at Oxford University, where he was musical director of the Experimental Theatre Club and she was in the choir.[4] They married two years later.[4] Their son David Arch is also a conductor, arranger and composer and is the musical director on the BBC Television show Strictly Come Dancing.[4] They also had a younger son, Jonathan, and moved to Sonning Common in 1964.[4]

Arch's death was announced on 8 June 2021.[10]