Fortune, Nigel

Nigel Cameron Fortune (5 December 1924 – 10 April 2009) was an English musicologist and political activist. Along with Thurston Dart, Oliver Neighbour and Stanley Sadie he was one of Britain's leading musicologists of the post-World War II generation. He played an instrumental part in improving professional musicological standards in England through research initiatives, conferences and scholarly publications. This greatly increased his country's international reputation in the field of music scholarship. Fortune's speciality in musicological research was in 17th-century Italian music and on the lives and works of George Friederich Handel and Henry Purcell. He contributed articles to several encyclopaedias and was notably one of the senior editors of The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. He also contributed writings or served as an editor to numerous music publications and books. For many years he was the co-editor of the journal Music & Letters.