Arthur Bliss thought Bliss's music competent but unremarkable. In 1961, Bliss and Hassall collaborated on a cantata, "The Beatitudes", commissioned for the opening of the new Coventry Cathedral. Reviews were friendly, but the work has rarely been performed since, and has been eclipsed by another choral work written for Coventry at the same time, Britten's "War Requiem". Bliss followed this with two further large-scale choral works, "Mary of Magdala" (1962) and "The Golden Cantata" (1963). Throughout his life, Bliss was vigilant on the state of music in Britain, about which he had written extensively since the 1920s. In 1969 he publicly censured
Earl of Coventry of his deceased uncle the Hon. Francis Coventry (1612–1680), failing which to 2) his three second cousins William Coventry, Thomas Coventry and Henry Coventry, grandsons of his deceased great-uncle Walter Coventry (d. 1640), younger brother of the first Baron Coventry. The titles were in the Peerage of England. He was succeeded by his eldest son, the second Earl. He was "Custos Rotulorum" of Worcestershire. His son, the third Earl, died as a child and was succeeded by his uncle, the fourth Earl. He had no sons and on his death in 1719 the barony of Coventry became extinct. He was