Hodges’ mu­sic­al gift showed it­self at an ear­ly age; by 1819, he was play­ing the or­gan at St. James’ Church in Bris­tol, and at St. Nicholas’, 1821-1838. He al­so had an in­ter­est­ing me­chan­ic­al bent, and spurred sev­er­al tech­ni­cal im­prove­ments in or­gan de­sign. He com­posed a num­ber of serv­ic­es and an­them piec­es, and Cam­bridge Un­i­ver­si­ty award­ed him a doc­tor­ate in mu­sic in 1825.

Hodges event­u­al­ly em­i­grat­ed, ac­cept­ing a post at the ca­thed­ral in To­ron­to, Ca­na­da, in 1838. The next year, he be­came mu­sic di­rect­or at Trin­i­ty Par­ish in New York Ci­ty. He be­came the or­gan­ist at Trin­i­ty Church when it opened in 1846 (the church had its or­gan built to his spe­ci­fi­ca­tions). He re­tired for health rea­sons in 1859, and re­turned to his na­tive Eng­land in 1863. Hodges’ works in­clude:

• “An Apol­o­gy for Church Mu­sic and Mu­sic­al Fes­tiv­als, in Ans­wer…to the Stan­dard and the Re­cord” (Lond­on: 1834)
• “Essays on the Ob­jects of Mu­sic­al Study” (Bris­tol, Eng­land: 1838)
• “An Es­say on the Cul­ti­va­tion of Church Mu­sic” (New York: 1841)
• Contributions to the Quar­ter­ly Mu­sic­al Mag­a­zine & Mu­sic­al World
• Trin­i­ty Col­lect­ion of Church Mu­sic (Bos­ton, Mass­a­chu­setts: 1864) (ed­it­or)

Sources

Music

1. Gloucester
2. Habakkuk
3. Hymn to Joy