John Bull is a national personification of Britain in general and England in particular, especially in political cartoons and similar graphic works. He is usually depicted as a stout, middle-aged, country dwelling, jolly, matter-of-fact man.

John Bull originated in the creation of Dr John Arbuthnot in 1712, and was popularised first by British print makers. Arbuthnot created Bull in his pamphlet Law is a Bottomless Pit (1712)." Originally derided, William Hogarth and other British writers made Bull "a heroic archetype of the freeborn Englishman." Later, the figure of Bull was disseminated overseas by illustrators and writers such as American cartoonist Thomas Nast and Irish writer George Bernard Shaw, author of John Bull's Other Island.

Starting in the 1760s, Bull was portrayed as an Anglo-Saxon country dweller. He is almost always depicted in a buff-coloured waistcoat and a simple frock coat (in the past Navy blue, but more recently with the Union Jack colours).Britannia, or a lion, is sometimes used as an alternative in some editorial cartoons.

William Byrd (1540 or late 1539 – 4 July 1623) was an English composer of the Renaissance. He wrote in many of the forms current in England at the time, including various types of sacred and secular polyphony, keyboard (the so-called Virginalist school) and consort music.

Knowledge of Byrd's biography expanded in the late 20th century, thanks largely to the research of John Harley (Harley, 1997). Following the discovery of a document dated 2 October 1598 in which Byrd's age is given as "58 years or there abouts," it now appears that he was born in 1540. The older dating 1542–3 is derived from Byrd's will (endorsed on 22 November 1622) which describes him as 'in the 80th year of my age'. It now becomes clear that it must have been drafted about three years earlier than the date of endorsement. Byrd was born in London, the son of a Thomas Byrd (not Thomas Byrd of the Chapel Royal) about whom little is known. Byrd had two brothers, Symon'd and John, and four sisters. It is clear from a reference in the prefatory material in the Tallis/Byrd Cantiones of 1575 that Byrd was a pupil of Thomas Tallis, then the leading composing member of the Chapel Royal Choir. Byrd also worked in collaboration with two other Chapel Royal singing-men, John Sheppard and William Mundy, on one of his earliest compositions, a contribution to a joint setting of the alternatim psalm In exitu Israel composed for the procession to the font at the Paschal Vigil. As an item for the Sarum liturgy this was presumably composed near the end of the reign of Mary Tudor (1553–1558), whose Catholic beliefs impelled her to revive Sarum liturgical practices during her brief reign. In view of these contacts it is reasonable to speculate that Byrd was a Chapel Royal choirboy, though the surviving records do not name the choristers individually.

Big Bear or Mistahi-maskwa (c.1825 – 17 January 1888) was a Cree leader notable for his involvement in the North-West Rebellion and his subsequent imprisonment.

Big Bear was born in the Canadian Northwest, probably near Fort Carlton. Although he may have been Saulteaux, he was raised among the Plains Cree bands who wintered along the North Saskatchewan River.

By 1863, according to Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) records, Big Bear was leading a large number of Cree near Fort Carlton, but soon moved to the area near Fort Pitt where he lived with a much smaller group.

He participated in the 1870 Battle of the Belly River, and would later find conflict again in 1873, this time with Métis leader Gabriel Dumont. Canadian government records indicate that as of 1874, Big Bear led 65 lodges (approximately 520 people).

In the 1870s, the newly created Canadian government began to investigate signing treaties with the Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains, and sent gifts to encourage friendship. While some leaders accepted the gifts, Big Bear was not interested, declaring "when we set a fox-trap we scatter pieces of meat all round, but when the fox gets into the trap we knock him on the head; We want no bait; let your chiefs come like men and talk to us."

Gustav Leonhardt (30 May 1928, 's-Graveland – 16 January 2012, Amsterdam) was a renowned Dutch keyboard player, conductor, musicologist, teacher and editor. Leonhardt was a leading figure in the movement to perform music on period instruments. He professionally played many instruments, including the harpsichord, pipe organ, claviorganum (a combination of harpsichord and organ), clavichord and fortepiano. He also conducted orchestras and choruses.

He was born in 's-Graveland, North Holland and studied organ and harpsichord from 1947 to 1950 with Eduard Müller at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Basel. In 1950, he made his debut as a harpsichordist in Vienna, where he studied musicology. He was professor of harpsichord at the Academy of Music from 1952 to 1955 and at the Amsterdam Conservatory from 1954. He was also a church organist.

Leonhardt performed and conducted a variety of solo, chamber, orchestral, operatic, and choral music from the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical periods. Among the dozens of composers whose music he recorded as a harpsichordist, organist, clavichordist, fortepianist, chamber musician or conductor were Johann Sebastian Bach, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, Heinrich Biber, John Blow, Georg Böhm, William Byrd, André Campra, François Couperin, Louis Couperin, John Dowland, Jacques Duphly, Antoine Forqueray, Girolamo Frescobaldi, Johann Jakob Froberger, Orlando Gibbons, André Grétry, George Frideric Handel, Jacques-Martin Hotteterre, Jean-Baptiste Lully, Claudio Monteverdi, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Georg Muffat, Johann Pachelbel, Henry Purcell, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Christian Ritter, Johann Rosenmüller, Domenico Scarlatti, Agostino Steffani, Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, Georg Philipp Telemann, Manuel Valls, Antonio Vivaldi, and Matthias Weckmann.

Richard Ellsasser (September 14, 1926 - August 9, 1972) was an American concert organist, composer, and conductor, who was primarily active during the 1940s, 50's and 60's. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, on September 14, 1926, the young Ellsasser was a musical prodigy who studied piano and organ, first with his father, and later with Winslow Cheney and Albert Riemenschneider. At the age of seven, he toured the eastern United States as an organist with various symphony orchestras. He made his New York organ debut in 1937. At the age of 19 he became the youngest person in history to have played, from memory, all 250+ organ works of J. S. Bach.

Ellsasser later went on to study at Oberlin College, Baldwin-Wallace Conservatory (from which he obtained his Bachelor of Music degree), the School of Theology at Boston University, and the School of Religion at the University of Southern California (where he earned a Master's Degree in Theology). Ellsasser also earned a Doctorate from Boston University.

For many years, Ellsasser was Minister of Music at Wilshire United Methodist Church in Los Angeles, California, where he later created and directed a series of music festivals. In later years, he became Minister of Recitals at the First Congregational Church in Los Angeles.