The Sarum Rite (more properly called the Use of Salisbury) was a variant of the Roman Rite widely used for the ordering of Christian public worship, including the Mass and the Divine Office. It was established by Saint Osmund, Bishop of Salisbury in the 11th Century and was originally the local form used in the Cathedral and Diocese of Salisbury; it later became prevalent throughout southern England and came to be used throughout most of England, Wales, Ireland and later Scotland until the reign of Queen Mary. Although abandoned after the 16th century, it was also a notable influence on the pattern of Anglican liturgy represented in the Book of Common Prayer. Occasional interest in and attempts at restoration of the liturgy by Anglicans and Roman Catholics have not produced a general revival, however.

In 1078, William of Normandy appointed St Osmund, a Norman nobleman, as bishop of Salisbury (the modern name of the city known in Latin as "Sarum"). As bishop, Osmund initiated some revisions to the extant Celtic-Anglo-Saxon rite and the local adaptations of the Roman rite, drawing on both Norman and Anglo-Saxon traditions.

John Taverner (c. 1490 – 18 October 1545) was an English composer and organist, regarded as the most important English composer of his era.

Nothing is known of Taverner's activities before 1524. He appears to have come from south Lincolnshire, but there is no indication of his parentage. According to one of his own letters, he was related to the Yerburghs, a well-to-do Lincolnshire family. The earliest information is that in 1524 Taverner travelled from Tattershall, Lincolnshire, to the Church of St Botolph in nearby Boston as a guest singer. A couple years later, in 1526, Taverner became the first Organist and Master of the Choristers at Christ Church, Oxford, appointed by Cardinal Thomas Wolsey. The college had been founded in 1525 by Cardinal Wolsey, and was then known as Cardinal College. Immediately before this, Taverner had been a clerk fellow at the Collegiate Church of Tattershall, Lincolnshire. In 1528 he was reprimanded for his (probably minor) involvement with Lutherans, but escaped punishment for being "but a musician". Wolsey fell from favour in 1529, and in 1530 Taverner left the college.

Kenneth Leighton (2 October 1929 - August 24, 1988) was a British composer and pianist. His compositions include much Anglican church music, and many pieces for choir and for piano as well as concertos, symphonies, much chamber music and an opera. He wrote a well-known setting of the Coventry Carol. He spent his last 18 years as Professor of Music at Edinburgh University.

Leighton was born in Wakefield, Yorkshire on 2 October 1929. He attended Queen Elizabeth Grammar School and became a chorister at Wakefield Cathedral. As well as singing, he took piano lessons and gained his Licentiate of the Royal College of Music (LRAM) in piano performance in 1946. He went to Queen's College, Oxford in 1947 on a Hastings Scholarship to study Classics. At the same time, he continued to study music, his teachers including the composer Bernard Rose, and he gained two degrees: a BA in Classics in 1950, and a BMus in 1951. In 1951 he also won the Mendelssohn Scholarship for his Symphony for Strings, Opus 3, and his cantata Hippolytus. The Scholarship enabled him to travel to Rome to study with Goffredo Petrassi. In Rome he met his first wife, Lydia Vignapiano.

William F. Renwick (December 30, 1915 – February 28, 1981) is a former Democratic member of the Pennsylvania House of Representatives.