The Woman of Samaria (Op. 44) was a sacred cantata written for the Birmingham Triennial Music Festival in 1867. It was written in the style of Medelssohn’s Elijah which had premiered at the same festivaltwenty years earlier. The chorus Abide With Me is a setting of the poem by Henry Francis Lyte for SATB choir and Piano accompaniment. Sir William Sterndale Bennett (1816-1875) was anEnglish composer pianist and conductor. He entered the Royal Academy of Music studying Violin Piano and composition. He spent time in Germany with Mendelsohn and Schumann before becoming Professor of Music at the Universityof Cambridge and later Principal of the RAM.
