Albert Coates

Albert Henry Coates (born April 23, 1882 in St. Petersburg , † December 11, 1953 in Milnerton near Cape Town ) was an English conductor and composer .

life and work

Albert Coates' parents were of English descent, the father a businessman in St. Petersburg. Coates went to school in London and studied at the University of Liverpool . Back in Russia, he was supposed to take over his father's business. However, he decided to study music, which he began in 1902 at the Leipzig Conservatory, initially in the subjects of cello and piano, but then switched to conducting with Arthur Nikisch . Under Nikisch he worked as his assistant at the Leipzig Opera , followed by engagements as a conductor in Elberfeld , Dresden and Mannheim . A guest conductor at the Mariinsky Theater in 1911 resulted in his appointment as chief conductor there. He got to know Alexander Scriabin , for whose work he was committed. In 1914 he conducted Richard Wagner in Covent Garden . In 1919 Coates left Russia and in 1920 became conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra , which he had directed for the first time in 1910. In 1920 the first recordings were made and he directed a. a. the first complete performance of Gustav Holst's The Planets . Guest conductors abroad followed. From 1923 to 1925 he was musical director of the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra . In 1926 he conducted the first performance of Nikolai Andreevich Rimsky-Korsakov's opera The Legend of the Invisible City of Kitesch and of the Virgin Fevronija outside Russia. He also conducted several concerts with the New York Philharmonic in the same year . He then worked as a guest conductor, also in Europe (around 1935 with the Vienna Philharmonic ). In 1946 he moved to South Africa , where he first conducted the Johannesburg Municipal Orchestra and then the Cape Town Municipal Orchestra.

Albert Coates was also active as a composer; among his works is u. a. the symphonic poem The Eagle in memoriam Arthur Nikisch (1925) and nine operas, including Samuel Pepys (premiered in Munich in 1929), Pickwick (premiered in Covent Garden in 1936) and Van Hunks & the Devil (premiered in South Africa in 1952).

literature

• The New Grove, 2nd Edition (article by Michael Kennedy)

Web links

• Albert Coates Collection, Documentation Center for Music (DOMUS), Music Library, Stellenbosch University, South Africa, with introductory biography (Engl.)