Kenneth Shenton writes:

ONE of the last of the old-style cathedral-articled pupils, Christopher Morris, who died on 23 November, aged 92, was an elder statesman of English church music. During a long career as music editor for Oxford University Press, he oversaw a series of definitive publications, not least the best-selling Carols for Choirs. For 25 years, he was also organist of St George's, Hanover Square, London.

Christopher John Morris was born into a musical family in Clevedon, Somerset. His siblings were Gareth, for 24 years principal flautist with the Philharmonia Orchestra, and James (later Jan), the writer. Educated as a chorister at Hereford Cathedral, he later became an articled pupil of its organist, the redoubtable Sir Percy Hull. It was Hull who instilled in him the academic excellence that characterised his subsequent career.

After war service, he went on to study with C. H. Trevor at the Royal Academy of Music. In 1947, Morris succeeded the long-serving Dr Charles Jolley as custodian of the increasingly unreliable Hope Jones organ at St George's, in Mayfair. Revelling in its rich ecclesiastical surroundings, he directed a small, skilful choir whose resources he used with imagination and skill.

Seven years later, he joined OUP as a music editor. Working closely with his head of publishing, Alan Frank, he also enjoyed productive partnerships with the composers Ralph Vaughan Williams and William Walton. Taking particular responsibility for all church and organ music, in 1963 he joined Walter Emery and Thurston Dart in providing a definitive treatise, Editing Early Music. In 1975, Morris succeeded Frank as head of music.

As well as his individual organ arrangements of music by Gluck, Purcell, and Vaughan Williams, there were many collections, their covers invariably adorned by pictures of the organ of St George's. These included A Festal Album, An Album of Preludes and Interludes, A Book of Organ Miniatures, and an Album of Postludes. For choirs, Morris compiled A Sixteenth Century Anthem Book, Anthems for Choirs 4, The Oxford Book of Tudor Anthems, and The Pilgrim's Journey, a cantata based on the music of Vaughan Williams. Later he developed the company's own record label.

Long feeling that The Oxford Book of Carols was past its sell-by date, Morris attempted to update the collection. Its contents could not be changed, however, without the permission of its three editors, Vaughan Williams, Martin Shaw, and Percy Dearmer, or of their widows. In its place, Morris brought together Reginald Jacques and the organist of King's College, Cam-bridge, David Willcocks, to compile a new volume, which was initially called Carols for Concerts.

Included among its 50 carols were four new compositions, by Arnold Cooke, Phyllis Tate, Walton, and Jacques himself. Particularly innovative was the inclusion of the texts of the traditional Nine Lessons, a separate words booklet for the congregation, and, adding greater flexibility, accompanying string parts. Now, for the first time, enterprising choirs had the chance to try to emulate the peerless King's College, Cambridge, sound.

Despite its instant worldwide popularity, what became Carols for Choirs was originally intended as a stand-alone volume. Thus it would be a further ten years before a second volume appeared. In the mean time, however, after a long battle with illness, Reginald Jacques had died. To replace him, Morris turned to a 26-year-old Cambridge University postgraduate student whose name would soon become synonymous with Christmas: John Rutter. Notable among Rutter's contributions to this second collection were two early works that helped cement his reputation, Nativity Carol and Shepherd's Pipe Carol.

In 1977, Morris supplemented both books with a recording of 14 of the most popular items, released on OUP's record label (OUP 150). Next came Carols for Choirs 3, its contents seeking to serve an increasingly diverse range of occasions: carol services, church concerts, carol-singing, and end-of-term school events.

Responding to a gap in the market, Carols for Choirs 4, published in 1980, presented many of the best-loved hymns and carols arranged for sopranos and altos. Until the launch, in 2011, of Carols for Choirs 5, the original franchise ended in 1987, with the publication of 100 Carols for Choirs. This large collection, while embracing several new works, was essentially a retrospective, containing what the editors believed to be the best from all the earlier volumes. Morris's copy bears the dedication: "For Christopher, the father of Carols for Choirs", signed "David and John, 1987".

This talent as a polisher and refiner of other people's music has tended to obscure the merits of Morris's own original output. His love of the liturgy allowed him to write well for voices, a number of Christmas carols rightly enjoying great popularity. Of these, Born in a Manger was first heard in the Service of Nine Lessons and Carols, broadcast from King's College, Cambridge, in 1962. Sadly neglected is a delightful series of piano miniatures, Seven Key-Men. Though slight, each is cleverly and precisely imagined; their structures are handled with fluency and care.

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Music in 1985; and 12 months later, on his retire- ment from OUP, the University of Oxford awarded him an honorary MA. In later years, as he was never one to let his technique fall victim to neglect, locum duties as a relief organist brought his rich life full circle.

His wife predeceased him; a son and a daughter survive him.