Frederick Theodore Albert Delius (born Fritz Theodor Albert Delius; 29 January 1862 – 10 June 1934) was an English composer. He was born in Bradford, England, to a prosperous mercantile family and initially resisted attempts to involve him in the family business. In 1884 he was sent to Florida in the United States to manage an orange plantation. During his stay he developed an interest in music and was influenced by African American musical traditions. In 1886 he returned to Europe. After a short period of formal musical study in Germany beginning in 1886, Delius began a full-time career as a composer. He settled in Paris and later in Grez-sur-Loing in France, where he lived with his wife Jelka for most of the rest of his life, apart from the years of the First World War. Delius’s early successes occurred in Germany, where conductors including Hans Haym promoted his music from the late 1890s. In Britain his works were not widely performed until 1907, when conductor Thomas Beecham began to champion them. Beecham conducted the complete premiere of "A Mass of Life" in London in 1909, having previously premiered its second part in Germany in 1908. He also staged the opera "A Village Romeo and Juliet" at Covent Garden in 1910 and organised a six-day festival of Delius’s music in London in 1929, in addition to making gramophone recordings of many of the composer’s works. After 1918 Delius began to experience the effects of syphilis, which he had contracted earlier in his life in Paris. In later years he became paralysed and blind, but between 1928 and 1932 he completed several late compositions with the assistance of Eric Fenby, who served as his amanuensis. The lyrical style of Delius’s early works reflected the influence of music he encountered in the United States as well as European composers such as Edvard Grieg and Richard Wagner. Over time he developed a distinctive style characterised by individual orchestration and the use of chromatic harmony. Although his music has experienced varying levels of popularity, it has continued to be performed and studied. The Delius Society, founded in 1962, promotes awareness of his life and works and sponsors the annual Delius Prize competition for young musicians.