1942 in British music

This is a summary of 1942 in music in the United Kingdom.

Events

January/February – Serge Koussevitzky commissions Benjamin Britten to compose an opera, Peter Grimes, one of the first commissions given by the Koussevitzky Music Foundation.
16 March – Britten sails back to England with Peter Pears on board MS Axel Johnson.
20 March – Vera Lynn records The White Cliffs of Dover with Mantovani at Decca Records's West Hampstead studio.
29 June – Shostakovich’s Leningrad Symphony No. 7, the score of which has been smuggled out of the Soviet Union on microfilm, receives its first performance in Western Europe at the Proms in London, as an act of defiance following Germany's invasion of Russia.
26 August – In an act of wartime cultural diplomacy, John Ireland, Granville Bantock, Arnold Bax and Benjamin Britten deliver a letter to the wife of the Soviet Ambassador sending greetings from British composers to their Soviet counterparts.
November/December – E.J. Moeran's Symphony is the first British work to be recorded under the auspices of the British Council. The recording is made in Manchester by the Hallé Orchestra conducted by Leslie Heward.

22 October – Du Barry Was A Lady, London production opens at His Majesty's Theatre and runs for 178 performances
19 November – Let's Face It!, London production opens at the Hippodrome and runs for 348 performances

14 January – Harry Champion, music hall composer, 76
10 February – Felix Powell, musician, 63
17 May – Alfred Hollins, organist and composer, 76
12 June – Walter Leigh, composer, 36
16 June – Haldane Stewart, organist, composer and choirmaster, 74
17 June – Jessie Bond, singer and actress in Gilbert & Sullivan, 89
30 July – Dorothy Silk, soprano, 59
15 October – Dame Marie Tempest, opera and musical comedy singer, 78
23 November – Peadar Kearney, Irish Republican and songwriter, writer of the lyrics to The Soldier's Song, 58