John Coates (tenor) - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

John Coates was a leading English tenor

Tenor

The tenor is a type of male singing voice and is the highest male voice within the modal register. The typical tenor voice lies between C3, the C one octave below middle C, to the A above middle C in choral music, and up to high C in solo work. The low extreme for tenors is roughly B2...

, who sang in opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

and oratorio

Oratorio

An oratorio is a large musical composition including an orchestra, a choir, and soloists. Like an opera, an oratorio includes the use of a choir, soloists, an ensemble, various distinguishable characters, and arias...

and on the concert platform. His repertoire ranged from Bach

Bạch

Bạch is a Vietnamese surname. The name is transliterated as Bai in Chinese and Baek, in Korean.Bach is the anglicized variation of the surname Bạch.-Notable people with the surname Bạch:* Bạch Liêu...

and Purcell

Purcell

Henry Purcell was an English composer.Purcell may also refer to:*Purcell, Indiana, an unincorporated community in Johnson Township, Knox County, Indiana*Purcell, Missouri, a city in Jasper County, Missouri, United States...

to contemporary works, and embraced the major heldentenor roles in Richard Wagner

Richard Wagner

Wilhelm Richard Wagner was a German composer, conductor, theatre director, philosopher, music theorist, poet, essayist and writer primarily known for his operas...

's operas. For more than 40 years, with only a four-year interruption for military service during World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, he overcame the limitations of a voice that was not naturally large by impressing listeners with his intense artistic expression, lively diction, musical versatility and memorable stage presence.

Coates spent some time on the European continent, toured Australia and South Africa in 1912–13 and performed in North America in the 1890s and again in 1925. He performed most often, however, in his native country and became a beloved figure at England's regional music festivals. Elgar's

Edward Elgar

Sir Edward William Elgar, 1st Baronet OM, GCVO was an English composer, many of whose works have entered the British and international classical concert repertoire. Among his best-known compositions are orchestral works including the Enigma Variations, the Pomp and Circumstance Marches, concertos...

Dream of Gerontius was one of his specialties. After 1921, he limited his performances to the concert stage and recitals, still performing a wide-ranging repertoire, but championing English composers. A dispute with music publishers about royalties clouded his later years.

Training and career as baritone

John Coates was born in Girlington, Bradford

Bradford

Bradford lies at the heart of the City of Bradford, a metropolitan borough of West Yorkshire, in Northern England. It is situated in the foothills of the Pennines, west of Leeds, and northwest of Wakefield. Bradford became a municipal borough in 1847, and received its charter as a city in 1897...

. He came from a musical family on both sides, and for many generations. He attended Bradford Grammar School, where Frederick Delius

Frederick Delius

Frederick Theodore Albert Delius, CH was an English composer. Born in the north of England to a prosperous mercantile family of German extraction, he resisted attempts to recruit him to commerce...

was his (slightly younger) contemporary. His early singing experience came as a chorister in a church choir (under his father's direction), where he learnt the importance of accent in singing from the performance of the Gregorian chant

Gregorian chant

Gregorian chant is the central tradition of Western plainchant, a form of monophonic liturgical music within Western Christianity that accompanied the celebration of Mass and other ritual services...

. He studied voice under multiple teachers: in Yorkshire

Yorkshire

Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...

under J. G. Walton, Robert Burton and Dr. J. C. Bridge, in London under W. Shakespeare and T. A. Wallworth, and in Paris under Jacques Bouhy

Jacques Bouhy

Jacques-Joseph-André Bouhy a Belgian baritone, most famous for being the first to sing the Toreador Song in the role of Escamillo in Carmen....

.

Coates began his performing career as a baritone

Baritone

Baritone is a type of male singing voice that lies between the bass and tenor voices. It is the most common male voice. Originally from the Greek , meaning deep sounding, music for this voice is typically written in the range from the second F below middle C to the F above middle C Baritone (or...

. He first appeared as Valentin in Gounod's Faust
Faust (opera)
Faust is a drame lyrique in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré from Carré's play Faust et Marguerite, in turn loosely based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Part 1...

, as an amateur, with the Carl Rosa Opera Company

Carl Rosa Opera Company

The Carl Rosa Opera Company was founded in 1873 by Carl August Nicholas Rosa, a German-born musical impresario, to present opera in English in London and the British provinces. The company survived Rosa's death in 1889, and continued to present opera in English on tour until 1960, when it was...

in Manchester and Liverpool. After further training, he was engaged by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company

D'Oyly Carte Opera Company

The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company was a professional light opera company that staged Gilbert and Sullivan's Savoy operas. The company performed nearly year-round in the UK and sometimes toured in Europe, North America and elsewhere, from the 1870s until it closed in 1982. It was revived in 1988 and...

for its 1894 tour, at first playing the baritone role of Mr. Goldbury in Utopia Limited in the original American production. He then created the role of Baron van den Berg in Mirette
Mirette (opera)
Mirette is an opéra comique in three acts composed by André Messager, first produced at the Savoy Theatre, London, on 3 July 1894.Mirette exists in two distinct versions. The first version of the libretto was written in French by Michel Carré but this was never performed. English lyrics were...

with D'Oyly Carte at the Savoy Theatre

Savoy Theatre

The Savoy Theatre is a West End theatre located in the Strand in the City of Westminster, London, England. The theatre opened on 10 October 1881 and was built by Richard D'Oyly Carte on the site of the old Savoy Palace as a showcase for the popular series of comic operas of Gilbert and Sullivan,...

, followed by more touring, and left the company in 1895. Coates then sang in Edwardian musical comedies in London and on tour in the United States. He also introduced Arthur Sullivan

Arthur Sullivan

Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan MVO was an English composer of Irish and Italian ancestry. He is best known for his series of 14 operatic collaborations with the dramatist W. S. Gilbert, including such enduring works as H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado...

's song, "The Absent-Minded Beggar

The Absent-Minded Beggar

"The Absent-Minded Beggar" is an 1899 poem by Rudyard Kipling, set to music by Sir Arthur Sullivan and often accompanied by an illustration by Richard Caton Woodville. The song was written as part of an appeal by the Daily Mail to raise money for soldiers fighting in the South African War and...

" at the Alhambra Theatre

Alhambra Theatre

The Alhambra was a popular theatre and music hall located on the east side of Leicester Square, in the West End of London. It was built originally as The Royal Panopticon of Science and Arts opening on 18 March 1854. It was closed after two years and reopened as the Alhambra. The building was...

in 1899.

1900-1916 in opera and touring

In the later 1890s, Coates left the stage for a medical operation on his vocal cords and further study, and reappeared as a tenor in light opera in 1899-1900 at the Globe Theatre

Globe Theatre (Newcastle Street)

The Globe was a Victorian theatre built in 1868 and demolished in 1902. It was the third of five London theatres to bear the name. It was also known at various times as the Royal Globe Theatre or Globe Theatre Royal. Its repertoire consisted mainly of comedies and musical shows...

in London. He first appeared at the Globe Theatre in The Gay Pretenders in November 1900 and then at Covent Garden Opera House to create the role of Claudio in Charles Villiers Stanford

Charles Villiers Stanford

Sir Charles Villiers Stanford was an Irish composer who was particularly notable for his choral music. He was professor at the Royal College of Music and University of Cambridge.- Life :...

's four-act opera Much Ado About Nothing
Much Ado About Nothing (opera)
Much Ado About Nothing is an opera in four acts by Charles Villiers Stanford with a libretto by Julian Sturgis based on Shakespeare's play Much Ado About Nothing. It premiered to considerable success at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden on 30 May 1901...

in 1901. Here he was in enthusiastic company with Marie Brema

Marie Brema

Marie Brema was an English dramatic mezzo-soprano singer in concert, operatic and oratorio work in the last decade of the 19th and the first decade of the 20th centuries...

(Beatrice), David Bispham

David Bispham

David Scull Bispham was the first American–born operatic baritone to win an international reputation.- Early life and family:...

(Benedick), Suzanne Adams

Suzanne Adams

Suzanne Adams was an American lyric coloratura soprano. Known for her agile and pure voice, Adams first became well known in France before establishing herself as one of the Metropolitan Opera's leading sopranos at the beginning of the twentieth century.-Biography:Adams was born in Cambridge,...

(Hero), Pol Plançon

Pol Plançon

Pol-Henri Plançon was a distinguished French operatic bass . He was one of the most acclaimed singers active during the 1880s, 1890s and early 20th century—a period often referred to as the "Golden Age of Opera".In addition to being among the earliest international opera stars to have made...

and Putnam Griswold

Putnam Griswold

Putnam Griswold was an American opera singer , born in Minneapolis, Minn. Originally he followed a business career. At the age of 22 he discovered his voice and began to study with a local teacher in California....

, though the press did not much appreciate the value of the work or their efforts. This was followed by Gounod's Faust

Faust (opera)

Faust is a drame lyrique in five acts by Charles Gounod to a French libretto by Jules Barbier and Michel Carré from Carré's play Faust et Marguerite, in turn loosely based on Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's Faust, Part 1...

, this time in the title role. That year he also appeared in the "Gurzenich's Concerts and Opera" at Cologne

Cologne

Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...

and at Leipzig

Leipzig

Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...

.

Coates became one of the most popular festival singers in England, singing at the triennial Leeds Festival

Leeds Festival

Leeds Festival may refer to:*Reading and Leeds Festivals , a rock music festival in Leeds , West Yorkshire, England*Leeds Festival , European classical music festival in Leeds...

in 1901 and performing Elgar's oratorio Dream of Gerontius at Worcester in 1902, followed by numerous other Elgar works. In 1902, he was heard at the Berlin

Berlin

Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...

and Hanover

Hanover

Hanover or Hannover, on the river Leine, is the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony , Germany and was once by personal union the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, under their title as the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg...

royal opera houses and, in 1906, at key venues in Dresden

Dresden

Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....

, Hamburg

Hamburg

-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...

, Frankfurt

Frankfurt

Frankfurt am Main , commonly known simply as Frankfurt, is the largest city in the German state of Hesse and the fifth-largest city in Germany, with a 2010 population of 688,249. The urban area had an estimated population of 2,300,000 in 2010...

, Mannheim

Mannheim

Mannheim is a city in southwestern Germany. With about 315,000 inhabitants, Mannheim is the second-largest city in the Bundesland of Baden-Württemberg, following the capital city of Stuttgart....

and Paris, plus the Cincinnati May Festival

Cincinnati May Festival

The Cincinnati May Festival is a two-week annual choral festival, held during the last two weekends in May in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. The festival's roots go back to the 1840s, when Saengerfests were held in that city, bringing singers from all over the United States and abroad to perform large...

. He sang for the English seasons of the Moody-Manners Company at Covent Garden in 1907 and 1908. Coates took part in the May 1908 premiere (concert) performance of Ethel Smyth

Ethel Smyth

Dame Ethel Mary Smyth, DBE was an English composer and a leader of the women's suffrage movement.- Early career :...

's The Wreckers
The Wreckers
-Studio albums:-Live albums:-Singles:-Featured singles:^ Song was credited as Santana with Michelle Branch and The Wreckers.-Music videos:-Awards and nominations:-External links:***...

, with Blanche Marchesi

Blanche Marchesi

Blanche Marchesi was a French mezzo-soprano and voice teacher best known for her interpretations of the works of Richard Wagner...

, under the baton of Artur Nikisch at the Queen's Hall, and in the Thomas Beecham

Thomas Beecham

Sir Thomas Beecham, 2nd Baronet CH was an English conductor and impresario best known for his association with the London Philharmonic and the Royal Philharmonic orchestras. He was also closely associated with the Liverpool Philharmonic and Hallé orchestras...

production of the same work at His Majesty's a year later. He appeared with the Carl Rosa company in 1909. Coates was a successful London Don Jose in Bizet's Carmen
Carmen
Carmen is a French opéra comique by Georges Bizet. The libretto is by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, first published in 1845, itself possibly influenced by the narrative poem The Gypsies by Alexander Pushkin...

. He was with the Beecham

Thomas Beecham

Company for the spring, summer and winter seasons of 1910, in which the brilliant production of Offenbach

Jacques Offenbach

Jacques Offenbach was a Prussian-born French composer, cellist and impresario. He is remembered for his nearly 100 operettas of the 1850s–1870s and his uncompleted opera The Tales of Hoffmann. He was a powerful influence on later composers of the operetta genre, particularly Johann Strauss, Jr....

's The Tales of Hoffman owed its success mainly to him, and he also appeared in an exceptionally romantic interpretation of Pedro in Eugen d'Albert

Eugen d'Albert

Eugen Francis Charles d'Albert was a Scottish-born German pianist and composer.Educated in Britain, d'Albert showed early musical talent and, at the age of seventeen, he won a scholarship to study in Austria...

's Tiefland
Tiefland (opera)
Tiefland is an opera in a prologue and three acts by Eugen d'Albert, to a libretto in German by Rudolph Lothar. Based on the 1896 Catalan play Terra baixa by Àngel Guimerà, Tiefland was d'Albert's seventh opera, and is the one which is now the best known.-Performance history:Tiefland was first...

. In 1911-13, he toured with the Quinlan Opera Company in provincial England, Australia and South Africa.

Despite his lack of raw vocal power, Coates was still considered to be among the finest of English Wagnerian tenors, especially as Siegfried and Tristan, owing to the strength of his musicianship, his evident intelligence and his impressive deportment on stage. Before the First World War, he also appeared in London as Lohengrin

Lohengrin (opera)

Lohengrin is a romantic opera in three acts composed and written by Richard Wagner, first performed in 1850. The story of the eponymous character is taken from medieval German romance, notably the Parzival of Wolfram von Eschenbach and its sequel, Lohengrin, written by a different author, itself...

, Tannhäuser

Tannhäuser (opera)

Tannhäuser is an opera in three acts, music and text by Richard Wagner, based on the two German legends of Tannhäuser and the song contest at Wartburg...

as well as Tristan

Tristan und Isolde

Tristan und Isolde is an opera, or music drama, in three acts by Richard Wagner to a German libretto by the composer, based largely on the romance by Gottfried von Straßburg. It was composed between 1857 and 1859 and premiered in Munich on 10 June 1865 with Hans von Bülow conducting...

. He sang often in Wagner concerts and appeared as Parsifal

Parsifal

Parsifal is an opera in three acts by Richard Wagner. It is loosely based on Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, the 13th century epic poem of the Arthurian knight Parzival and his quest for the Holy Grail, and on Chrétien de Troyes' Perceval, the Story of the Grail.Wagner first conceived the work...

in concert performances of the opera. He sang Lohengrin at Cologne, too, and in 1911, performed the Siegfrieds of both Siegfried
Siegfried (opera)
Siegfried is the third of the four operas that constitute Der Ring des Nibelungen , by Richard Wagner. It received its premiere at the Bayreuth Festspielhaus on 16 August 1876, as part of the first complete performance of The Ring...

and Götterdämmerung
Götterdämmerung
is the last in Richard Wagner's cycle of four operas titled Der Ring des Nibelungen...

for the Denhof company under Sir Thomas Beecham, appearing opposite the Wotan

Woden

Woden or Wodan is a major deity of Anglo-Saxon and Continental Germanic polytheism. Together with his Norse counterpart Odin, Woden represents a development of the Proto-Germanic god *Wōdanaz....

of Frederic Austin

Frederic Austin

Frederic Austin was an English baritone singer, a musical teacher and composer in the period 1905–30. He is best remembered for his restoration and production of The Beggar's Opera by John Gay and Johann Christoph Pepusch, and its sequel, Polly, in 1920–23...

1901-1916 in Festival and oratorio

The year 1901 saw John Coates' first English festival engagement, at Leeds

Leeds Festival

Leeds Festival may refer to:*Reading and Leeds Festivals , a rock music festival in Leeds , West Yorkshire, England*Leeds Festival , European classical music festival in Leeds...

, and he was thereafter in all the chief English festivals, notably at Worcester

Worcester

The City of Worcester, commonly known as Worcester, , is a city and county town of Worcestershire in the West Midlands of England. Worcester is situated some southwest of Birmingham and north of Gloucester, and has an approximate population of 94,000 people. The River Severn runs through the...

, Brighton

Brighton Festival

The Brighton Festival is an annual arts festival which takes place in the city of Brighton and Hove in England each May. It was founded in 1966, and is the largest multi-art form festival in England...

and Norwich

Norwich

Norwich is a city in England. It is the regional administrative centre and county town of Norfolk. During the 11th century, Norwich was the largest city in England after London, and one of the most important places in the kingdom...

, and at The Crystal Palace

The Crystal Palace

The Crystal Palace was a cast-iron and glass building originally erected in Hyde Park, London, England, to house the Great Exhibition of 1851. More than 14,000 exhibitors from around the world gathered in the Palace's of exhibition space to display examples of the latest technology developed in...

. In November 1900 he appeared for Henry J. Wood in the Arthur Sullivan

Arthur Sullivan

Memorial Concert at Queen's Hall

Queen's Hall

The Queen's Hall was a concert hall in Langham Place, London, opened in 1893. Designed by the architect T.E. Knightley, it had room for an audience of about 2,500 people. It became London's principal concert venue. From 1895 until 1941, it was the home of the promenade concerts founded by Robert...

in The Golden Legend, alongside Lillian Blauvelt

Lillian Blauvelt

Lillian Blauvelt was a popular opera singer in New York City, USA in the first decade of the 20th century. Her voice was a lyric soprano with...

, Louise Kirkby Lunn

Louise Kirkby Lunn

Louise Kirkby Lunn was an English contralto. Sometimes classified as a mezzo-soprano, she was a leading English-born singer of the first two decades of the 20th century, earning praise for her performances in concert, oratorio and opera.-Training:Kirkby Lunn had her early vocal training in her...

and David Ffrangcon-Davies.

He was above all admired in The Dream of Gerontius
The Dream of Gerontius
The Dream of Gerontius, popularly called just Gerontius, is a work for voices and orchestra in two parts composed by Edward Elgar in 1900, to text from the poem by John Henry Newman. It relates the journey of a pious man's soul from his deathbed to his judgment before God and settling into Purgatory...

, in which work he and fellow English-born tenor Gervase Elwes held foremost place in public esteem. In the 1902 Sheffield Festival he sang Gerontius under Elgar's baton with Marie Brema

Marie Brema

Marie Brema was an English dramatic mezzo-soprano singer in concert, operatic and oratorio work in the last decade of the 19th and the first decade of the 20th centuries...

and Ffrangcon-Davies, and with the same soloists under Henry J. Wood at the Queen's Hall, with the London Choral Society, in February 1904. He was chosen to appear at the Festival of Elgar's music under Hans Richter

Hans Richter (conductor)

Hans Richter was an Austrian orchestral and operatic conductor.-Biography:Richter was born in Raab , Kingdom of Hungary, Austro-Hungarian Empire. His mother was opera-singer Jozsefa Csazenszky. He studied at the Vienna Conservatory...

at the Royal Opera House

Royal Opera House

The Royal Opera House is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply "Covent Garden", after a previous use of the site of the opera house's original construction in 1732. It is the home of The Royal Opera, The...

, Covent Garden

Covent Garden

Covent Garden is a district in London on the eastern fringes of the West End, between St. Martin's Lane and Drury Lane. It is associated with the former fruit and vegetable market in the central square, now a popular shopping and tourist site, and the Royal Opera House, which is also known as...

, performing Gerontius on 14 March 1904 with Kirkby Lunn and Ffrangcon-Davies, and then with Agnes Nicholls

Agnes Nicholls

Agnes Nicholls was one of the greatest English sopranos of the 20th century, both in the concert hall and on the operatic stage....

, Kennerley Rumford and Andrew Black in The Apostles

The Apostles (Elgar)

The Apostles, Op. 49, is an oratorio for soloists, chorus and orchestra composed by Edward Elgar. It was first performed on 14 October 1903.-Overview:...

, on 15 March of that same year.

Elgar, writing to Frank Schuster in 1905, wanted to hear Coates perform the 'Three Holy Kings' scene from Wolfrum's Weihnachtsmysterium. Gerontius was performed with the 1904 line-up under Henry Wood's direction in his 1906 season. Then Frederic Austin

Frederic Austin

was Priest and Angel of the Agony to Coates's Soul at the Festivals of Southport

Southport

Southport is a seaside town in the Metropolitan Borough of Sefton in Merseyside, England. During the 2001 census Southport was recorded as having a population of 90,336, making it the eleventh most populous settlement in North West England...

(1906) and Birmingham

Birmingham

Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...

(1909) and at Manchester

Manchester

Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...

(1908). In 1907, in correspondence, Elgar wrote of him: 'The Arch-chanter John was the greatest success and a joy to see.'

Classical-singing commentator Michael Scott

Michael Scott (artistic director)

Michael Scott is the founder of the London Opera Society. In his role as the society's sole artistic director, he brought to London Marilyn Horne, Joan Sutherland, and Boris Christoff. He was also responsible for introducing Sherrill Milnes, Ruggero Raimondi, and Montserrat Caballe...

(who, incidentally, calls Coates 'one of the finest English singers on record') notes in The Record of Singing
The Record of Singing
The Record of Singing is a compilation of classical-music singing from the first half of the 20th century, the era of the 78-rpm record.It was issued on LP by EMI, successor to the British company His Master's Voice — perhaps the leading organization in the early history of audio recording.The...

that his repertoire was exceptionally wide-ranging and included Handel

HANDEL

HANDEL was the code-name for the UK's National Attack Warning System in the Cold War. It consisted of a small console consisting of two microphones, lights and gauges. The reason behind this was to provide a back-up if anything failed....

's Messiah

Messiah (Handel)

Messiah is an English-language oratorio composed in 1741 by George Frideric Handel, with a scriptural text compiled by Charles Jennens from the King James Bible and the Book of Common Prayer. It was first performed in Dublin on 13 April 1742, and received its London premiere nearly a year later...

and Belshazzar

Belshazzar (Handel)

Belshazzar is an oratorio by George Frideric Handel. The libretto was by Charles Jennens, and Handel abridged it considerably. Jennens' libretto was based on the Biblical account of the fall of Babylon at the hands of Cyrus the Great and the subsequent freeing of the Jewish nation, as found in the...

, Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn

Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Barthóldy , use the form 'Mendelssohn' and not 'Mendelssohn Bartholdy'. The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians gives ' Felix Mendelssohn' as the entry, with 'Mendelssohn' used in the body text...

's St Paul

St. Paul (oratorio)

St. Paul , Op. 36, is an oratorio by Felix Mendelssohn.The libretto was begun in 1832 by the composer with Pastor Julius Schubring, a childhood friend, pulling together passages from the New Testament and Old Testament...

and Elijah
Elijah (oratorio)
Elijah, in German: Elias, is an oratorio written by Felix Mendelssohn in 1846 for the Birmingham Festival. It depicts various events in the life of the Biblical prophet Elijah, taken from the books 1 Kings and 2 Kings in the Old Testament....

, Bach

Bạch

's St Matthew Passion, Elgar's King Olaf and Saint-Saëns's The Promised Land. John Coates and Gervase Elwes were great friends, and Coates stood in for an indisposed Elwes on (at least) one occasion at Gloucester

Gloucester

Gloucester is a city, district and county town of Gloucestershire in the South West region of England. Gloucester lies close to the Welsh border, and on the River Severn, approximately north-east of Bristol, and south-southwest of Birmingham....

. On another occasion, at Worcester

Worcester

in 1911, Elwes (a Roman Catholic) was booked to sing Gerontius, but upon being told that the name of Mary Mother of God must be excluded from the text (to sing, 'Jesu, pray for me' instead of 'Mary' etc., and with other absurd substitutions and cuts) on the insistence of the Dean and Chapter, he refused to perform, and Coates was called in to replace him. Coates performed the Bach Mass in B minor in the April Festival of 1915 at Queen's Hall

Queen's Hall

, under Henri Verbrugghen

Henri Verbrugghen

Henri Verbrugghen was a Belgian musician, who directed orchestras in England, Scotland, Australia and the United States....

War service and later career

Coates then saw four years' war service in France as a captain in the Yorkshire Regiment

Yorkshire Regiment

The Yorkshire Regiment is one of the largest infantry regiments of the British Army. The regiment is currently the only line infantry or rifles unit to represent a single geographical county in the new infantry structure, serving as the county regiment of Yorkshire covering the historical areas...

(from 1916-1919). In March 1919, he signaled his return to music by giving the first of a long series of English-song recitals, with Anthony Bernard

Anthony Bernard

Anthony Bernard was an English conductor, organist, pianist and composer.-Early life:He was born Alan Charles Butler, the son of a Thames lighterman and changed his name by deed poll in 1919 according to the National Archives....

at the piano, at the Queen's Hall

Queen's Hall

. His programs, his enjoyment of the work, his diction and characterization were intensely admired in them.

In 1921, he appeared again in opera as Don José in Carmen

Carmen

Carmen is a French opéra comique by Georges Bizet. The libretto is by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on the novella of the same title by Prosper Mérimée, first published in 1845, itself possibly influenced by the narrative poem The Gypsies by Alexander Pushkin...

and as Lohengrin for Carl Rosa at Covent Garden, but thereafter devoted most of his efforts to concert performance. In 1921 he sang Gerontius at the memorial meeting for Gervase Elwes at the Royal Albert Hall

Royal Albert Hall

The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall situated on the northern edge of the South Kensington area, in the City of Westminster, London, England, best known for holding the annual summer Proms concerts since 1941....

with the Royal Choral Society

Royal Choral Society

The Royal Choral Society is an amateur choir, based in London. Formed soon after the opening of the Royal Albert Hall in 1871, the choir gave its first performance as the Royal Albert Hall Choral Society on 8 May 1872 – the choir's first conductor Charles Gounod included the Hallelujah Chorus from...

. (He sang wonderfully, according to the Sunday Times, a courageous thing to do since in his own words he found the sudden death of Elwes in a train accident 'too shocking, too staggering to contemplate. It has affected me to the very depths of my nature ... it brought me to my knees.') From 1920 he began to specialise in song-recitals, of which he gave several each year, favouring all-English performances and championing English composers, but drawing from the repertoire of German and French songs also. In 1922 Roger Quilter

Roger Quilter

Roger Quilter was an English composer, known particularly for his songs.-Biography:Born in Hove, Sussex, Quilter was a younger son of Sir William Quilter, 1st Baronet, who was a noted art collector...

, who had written much for Elwes and worked closely with him, dedicated his 'Morning song' (Thomas Heywood

Thomas Heywood

Thomas Heywood was a prominent English playwright, actor, and author whose peak period of activity falls between late Elizabethan and early Jacobean theatre.-Early years:...

) to Coates, one of his most vibrant and characteristic miniatures, though Coates did not give the first performance of it.

As the 1920s unfurled, Coates faced competition at home from an emerging generation of British tenors led by Walter Widdop

Walter Widdop

Walter Widdop was a British operatic tenor who is best remembered for his Wagnerian performances. His repertoire also encompassed works by Verdi, Leoncavallo, Handel and Bach.-Career:...

and Heddle Nash

Heddle Nash

William Heddle Nash was an English lyric tenor who appeared in opera and oratorio in the middle decades of the twentieth century. He also made numerous recordings that are still available on CD reissues....

. He toured overseas energetically and in 1925 he made his only extended tour of North America, including Canada as well as the United States on his itinerary. For this trip his usual partner on the piano, Berkeley Mason, was not available. Instead, he found Gerald Moore

Gerald Moore

Gerald Moore CBE was an English pianist best known for his career as one of the most in-demand accompanists of his day, accompanying many of the world's most famous musicians...

, then a young accompanist at the beginning of his career. Moore had often heard Coates' recitals at Chelsea

Chelsea, London

Chelsea is an area of West London, England, bounded to the south by the River Thames, where its frontage runs from Chelsea Bridge along the Chelsea Embankment, Cheyne Walk, Lots Road and Chelsea Harbour. Its eastern boundary was once defined by the River Westbourne, which is now in a pipe above...

Town Hall, but it was through the Australian baritone Peter Dawson (with whom Moore had toured) that the contact came. Once the contact was made, Moore became Coates' sole accompanist for four or five years. Moore devotes a chapter of his memoirs to Coates. He found the tenor a hard taskmaster, but one who transformed him from a mediocre accompanist to an artist with a full realisation of the duties and possibilities of the accompanist's role, aware of the necessity of being a full participant in every living nuance and accent of the music at hand. Moore considered that Coates had laid the groundwork of whatever was truly excellent in his work. Indeed, Coates had told him that the American tour would 'kill or cure' him, and considered the result a 'cure'. The Coates-Moore partnership eventually dissolved over a rehearsal-fees' disagreement, though any cracks in the friendship were repaired by 1929.

Like his renowned British tenor predecessors Sims Reeves

Sims Reeves

John Sims Reeves , usually called simply Sims Reeves, was the foremost English operatic, oratorio and ballad tenor vocalist of the mid-Victorian era....

and Edward Lloyd

Edward Lloyd (tenor)

Edward Lloyd was a British tenor singer who excelled in concert and oratorio performance, and was recognised as a legitimate successor of John Sims Reeves as the foremost tenor exponent of that genre during the last quarter of the nineteenth century.- Early training in choral tradition :Edward...

, Coates had a famously protective wife. Moore refers to Coates' home life as serene, with an adorable spouse, sons and daughters; but he thought, despite Coates's good humour, he was not a happy person because he was too much of a worrier. Coates developed financial headaches, too. He wasted a good deal of money in a legal case that he launched against the Performing Right Society

Performing Right Society

PRS for Music is a UK copyright collection society undertaking collective rights management for musical works. PRS for Music was formed in 1997 as the MCPS-PRS Alliance, bringing together two collection societies: the Mechanical-Copyright Protection Society and Performing Right Society...

, in which he argued that he should not have to pay a royalty to perform music in public which had been brought to him in manuscript, and which therefore, by agreeing to sing it, Coates had encouraged the publishers to publish. He lost the case, and it preyed on his mind and finances for long after, though he refused offers of financial support from other singers. In his last years he thought of going back on the stage and started to slim, but he was seized with anaemia and became permanently confined to bed, frustrated at being unable to assist his country as the Second World War took hold. In July 1940, Gerald Moore presented a half-hour broadcast in tribute to their work together, and received a last letter from him in friendship and gratitude.

Coates died in Northwood, London in 1941, aged 76.

Reputation

Conductor Sir Thomas Beecham

Thomas Beecham

remarked of him: 'Coates was among the half-dozen most interesting artistic personalities of the time in England – scrupulous, fastidious and conscientious in all that he attempted. His appearance on the stage was noble and animated, and his voice, although of moderate power, was flexible and expressive. His diction was admirable and his singing of English an unalloyed pleasure to the ear.' In 1924 Eaglefield Hull

Arthur Eaglefield Hull

Arthur Eaglefield Hull was an English music critic, writer, composer and organist.Hull was initially a music student of Tobias Matthay and graduated with a Doctorate of Music from Oxford University...

wrote: 'He unites to a fine tenor voice, wide culture, perfection of vocal declamation and high dramatic attainments.'

Of his concert repertoire Gerald Moore wrote: 'Was there ever a singer with a wider repertoire ...? He was equally at home in the lieder of Beethoven, Schubert and Schumann

Robert Schumann

Robert Schumann, sometimes known as Robert Alexander Schumann, was a German composer, aesthete and influential music critic. He is regarded as one of the greatest and most representative composers of the Romantic era....

as he was with the early English songs of Arne

Thomas Augustine Arne

Thomas Augustine Arne was a British composer, best known for the patriotic song Rule, Britannia!. He also wrote a version of God Save the King, which was to become the British national anthem, and the song A-Hunting We Will Go...

, Byrd

William Byrd

William Byrd was an English composer of the Renaissance. He wrote in many of the forms current in England at the time, including various types of sacred and secular polyphony, keyboard and consort music.-Provenance:Knowledge of Byrd's biography expanded in the late 20th century, thanks largely...

and Purcell

Henry Purcell

Henry Purcell – 21 November 1695), was an English organist and Baroque composer of secular and sacred music. Although Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, his legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music...

; he championed the songs of Bax

Arnold Bax

Sir Arnold Edward Trevor Bax, KCVO was an English composer and poet. His musical style blended elements of romanticism and impressionism, often with influences from Irish literature and landscape. His orchestral scores are noted for their complexity and colourful instrumentation...

, Ireland

John Ireland (composer)

John Nicholson Ireland was an English composer.- Life :John Ireland was born in Bowdon, near Altrincham, Manchester, into a family of Scottish descent and some cultural distinction. His father, Alexander Ireland, a publisher and newspaper proprietor, was aged 70 at John's birth...

, Howells

Herbert Howells

Herbert Norman Howells CH was an English composer, organist, and teacher, most famous for his large output of Anglican church music.-Life:...

, Warlock

Peter Warlock

Peter Warlock was a pseudonym of Philip Arnold Heseltine , an Anglo-Welsh composer and music critic. He used the pseudonym when composing, and is now better known by this name....

, and was abreast of the younger school; the chansons of Weckerlin, Bruneau

Alfred Bruneau

Louis-Charles-Bonaventure-Alfred Bruneau was a French composer who played a key role in the introduction of realism in French opera....

, Lully

Jean-Baptiste Lully

Jean-Baptiste de Lully was an Italian-born French composer who spent most of his life working in the court of Louis XIV of France. He is considered the chief master of the French Baroque style. Lully disavowed any Italian influence in French music of the period. He became a French subject in...

, tripped as easily off his tongue as did Fauré

Gabriel Fauré

Gabriel Urbain Fauré was a French composer, organist, pianist and teacher. He was one of the foremost French composers of his generation, and his musical style influenced many 20th century composers...

and Duparc. In Germany they called him the ideal Siegfried and Lohengrin. He had played many roles at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, under Sir Thomas Beecham, and it is a moot point whether he or Gervase Elwes was the finest Gerontius of that era.'

Recordings

John Coates recorded first for the British Gramophone Company

Gramophone Company

The Gramophone Company, based in the United Kingdom, was one of the early recording companies, and was the parent organization for the famous "His Master's Voice" label...

, beginning in 1907. Afterwards, he made discs for Columbia Records

Columbia Records

Columbia Records is an American record label, owned by Japan's Sony Music Entertainment, operating under the Columbia Music Group with Aware Records. It was founded in 1888, evolving from an earlier enterprise, the American Graphophone Company — successor to the Volta Graphophone Company...

(including by the electrical recording process). His acoustic recordings of 1907-1915 included:

Gramophone Company: English and Italian Catalogues:

3-2910 Take a pair of sparkling eyes, from The Gondoliers (Sullivan). 1907
3-2911 John's wife (Roeckel). 1907
3-2963 Eldorado (Mallison). 1908
3-2968 There is a flower that bloometh, from Maritana (Vincent Wallace). 1908
3-2984 At the mid hour of night (Cowen). 1908
3-2985 Green grow the rashes, O. 1908
4-2552 Ninetta (Brewer). 1915 (E34)
4-2614 O may my dreams come true (Fothergill). 1915 (E34)
02092 Cielo e mar, from La Gioconda (Ponchielli). 1907
02100 Dai campi, dai prati, from Mefistofele (Boito). 1907
02108 Lohengrin's farewell, from Lohengrin (Wagner). 1907
02109 Lohengrin's narration, from Lohengrin (Wagner). 1907
02111 Come into the garden, Maud (Balfe). 1907
02144 Celeste Aida, from Aida (Verdi). 1908
02145 Watchman's scene, from Hymn of Praise (Mendelssohn). 1908
02172 Too late! (Atkins). 1909
02584 In the Dawn
In the Dawn
”In the Dawn” is a song written by the English composer Edward Elgar in 1901 as his Op.41, No.1.The words are from the poem “The Professor” by Arthur Christopher Benson....

(Elgar). 1915
052219 Cielo e mar, from La Gioconda (Ponchielli). 1908
052223 Giunto sul passo estremo, from Mefistofele (Boito). 1908

Images

In Kobbe 1922: John Coates as Siegfried (p195), Tristan (p229) and as Dick Johnson (La Fanciulla del West, Puccini)(p675).
In Scott 1979: John Coates portrait, Pl 125 (p171).
In Lee-Browne 1999: John Coates as Hoffmann, Plate vii.

Sources

T. Beecham, A Mingled Chime (Hutchinson, 1944).
T. Beecham, Frederick Delius (Hutchinson, 1959).
J.R. Bennett, Voices of the Past: Catalogue of Vocal recordings from the English Catalogue of the Gramophone Company, etc. (1955).
J.R. Bennett, Voices of the Past Vol. 2: Catalogue of Vocal recordings from the Italian Catalogues of the Gramophone Company, etc. (Oakwood Press, 1967).
D. Bispham, A Quaker Singer's recollections (Macmillan, New York 1920).
G. Davidson, Opera Biographies (Werner Laurie, London 1955).
A. Eaglefield-Hull (Ed), A Dictionary of Modern Music and Musicians (Dent, London 1924).
W. Elwes and R. Elwes, Gervase Elwes, The Story of his Life (Grayson and Grayson, London 1935).
G. Kobbé
Gustav Kobbé
Gustav Kobbé M.A. was an American music critic and author, best known for his guide to the operas, The Complete Opera Book, first published in the United States in 1919 and the United Kingdom in 1922.- Biography :Kobbé was born in March 1857 in New York City to William...

, The Complete Opera Book
The Complete Opera Book
The Complete Opera Book is a guide to operas by American music critic and author Gustav Kobbé first published in the United States in 1919 and the United Kingdom in 1922...

, 1st English Edn (Putnam's, London 1922).
M. Lee-Browne, Nothing so Charming as Musick! The Life and Times of Frederic Austin (Thames, London 1999).
G. Moore, Am I too Loud? (Hamish Hamilton 1962).
H. Rosenthal and J. Warrack, Concise Oxford Dictionary of Opera (Corrected Edition) (London 1974).
Musical Times, 1 December 1911.
M. Scott, The Record of Singing
The Record of Singing
The Record of Singing is a compilation of classical-music singing from the first half of the 20th century, the era of the 78-rpm record.It was issued on LP by EMI, successor to the British company His Master's Voice — perhaps the leading organization in the early history of audio recording.The...

Vol 2: 1914-1925 (Duckworth, London 1979).
H. Wood, My Life of Music (Gollancz, London 1938).
P.M. Young, Letters of Edward Elgar and other writings (Geoffrey Bles, London 1956).

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