Oratorio credited with writing the first English language oratorio, "Esther". Handel's imitators included the Italian Lidarti who was employed by the Amsterdam Jewish community to compose a Hebrew version of "Esther". Britain continued to look to Germany for its composers of oratorio. The Birmingham Festival commissioned various oratorios including Felix Mendelssohn's "Elijah" in 1846, later performed in German as "Elias". German composer Georg Vierling is noted for modernizing the secular oratorio form. John Stainer's "The Crucifixion" (1887) became the stereotypical battlehorse of massed amateur choral societies. Edward Elgar tried to revive the genre around the turn of century with the composition
Paul Benoit (composer) Paul Benoit (composer) Dom Paul Benoit, OSB (9 December 1893 – 10 April 1979) was a Benedictine monk, organist, and composer. Paul Benoit was born December 9, 1893 in Nancy, France. During World War I, Benoit first began to feel called to the vocation of a Benedictine monk. After the Armistice of 1918, he entered a retreat at the Benedictine Abbey of St. Maurice and St. Maur, at Clervaux in Luxembourg, and he joined the abbey in 1919. After taking his vows (1921) and being ordained into priesthood (1926), he was called "Dom Paul Benoit." "Dom" is the traditional title