John Coates (29 June 1865 – 16 August 1941) was a leading English tenor, who sang in opera and oratorio and on the concert platform. His repertoire ranged from Bach and Purcell to contemporary works, and embraced the major heldentenor roles in Richard Wagner's operas. For more than 40 years, with only a four-year interruption for military service during World War I, 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 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 Coates was born in Girlington, Bradford on 29 June 1865."John Coates Dead", Leicester Evening Mail, 16 August 1941, p. 4. Retrieved 10 January 2024. Via Newspapers.com He came from a musical family on both sides, and for many generations. He attended Bradford Grammar School, where Frederick Delius was his (slightly younger) contemporary.T. Beecham, Frederick Delius (Hutchinson, London 1959), 18. 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. He studied voice under multiple teachers: in Yorkshire under J. G. Walton, Robert Burton and J. C. Bridge, in London under W. Shakespeare and T. A. Wallworth, and in Paris under Jacques Bouhy.A. Eaglefield-Hull, A Dictionary of Modern Music and Musicians (Dent, London 1924).
Coates began his performing career as a baritone. He first appeared as Valentin in Gounod's Faust, as an amateur, with the Carl Rosa Opera Company in Manchester and Liverpool. After further training, he was engaged by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company for its 1894 tour, at first playing the baritone role of Mr. Goldbury in Utopia Limited in the original American production.Kanthor, Hal. "Gilbert and Sullivan: From London to America" , University of Rochester, accessed 7 June 2010. Click on the New York programme for Utopia to see cast list. He then created the role of Baron van den Berg in Mirette with D'Oyly Carte at the Savoy Theatre, followed by more touring, and left the company in 1895.Stone, David. "John Coates", Who Was Who in the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, 2 December 2001. Retrieved 10 January 2024 Coates then sang in Edwardian musical comedies in London and on tour in the United States.Eaglefield-Hull 1924. He also introduced Arthur Sullivan's song, "The Absent-Minded Beggar" at the Alhambra Theatre 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,M. Scott, The Record of Singing II (Duckworth, London 1979), 171. and reappeared as a tenor in light opera in 1899–1900 at the Globe Theatre 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's four-act opera Much Ado About Nothing in 1901.Eaglefield-Hull 1924; G. Davidson, Opera Biographies (Werner Laurie, London 1955), 71-73). The press did not much appreciate the production.D. Bispham, A Quaker Singer's Recollections (Macmillan, New York 1920), 294. This was followed by Gounod's Faust, this time in the title role. That year he also appeared in the "Gürzenich's Concerts and Opera" at Cologne and at Leipzig.
Coates became one of the most popular festival singers in England, singing at the triennial Leeds Festival 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 and Hanover royal opera houses and, in 1906, at key venues in Dresden, Hamburg, Frankfurt, Mannheim and Paris, plus the Cincinnati May Festival. He sang for the English seasons of the Moody-Manners Company at Covent Garden in 1907 and 1908.Davidson 1955. Coates took part in the May 1908 premiere (concert) performance of Ethel Smyth's The Wreckers, with Blanche Marchesi, under the baton of Artur Nikisch at the Queen's Hall,Elkin 1944, 88. and in the Thomas Beecham 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.cf also Scott 1979, 171. He was with the Beecham Company for the spring, summer and winter seasons of 1910, in which the brilliant production of Offenbach's The Tales of Hoffmann owed its success mainly to him, and he also appeared in an exceptionally romantic interpretation of Pedro in Eugen d'Albert's Tiefland. 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, Tannhäuser as well as Tristan. He sang often in Wagner concerts and appeared as Parsifal in concert performances of the opera. He sang Lohengrin at Cologne, too, and in 1911, performed the Siegfrieds of both Siegfried and Götterdämmerung for the Denhof Opera Company under Sir Thomas Beecham, appearing opposite the Wotan of Frederic Austin.Davidson 1955; cf T. Beecham, A Mingled Chime (Hutchinson, London 1944).
1901–1916 in festival and oratorio The year 1901 saw John Coates' first English festival engagement, at Leeds, and he was thereafter in all the chief English festivals, notably at Worcester, Brighton and Norwich, and at The Crystal Palace.Eaglefield-Hull 1924; Scott 1979, 171. In November 1900 he appeared for Henry J. Wood in the Arthur Sullivan Memorial Concert at Queen's Hall in The Golden Legend, alongside Lillian Blauvelt, Louise Kirkby Lunn and David Ffrangcon-Davies.H. J. Wood, My Life of Music (Gollancz, London 1946 edn), 155.
He was above all admired in The Dream of Gerontius, 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 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.R. Elkin, Queen's Hall 1893-1941 (Rider, London 1944), 64. He was chosen to appear at the Festival of Elgar's music under Hans Richter at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, performing Gerontius on 14 March 1904 with Kirkby Lunn and Ffrangcon-Davies, and then with Agnes Nicholls, Kennerley Rumford and Andrew Black in The Apostles, on 15 March of that same year.Percy M. Young, Letters of Edward Elgar (Geoffrey Bles, London 1956), 131-132.
Elgar, writing to Frank Schuster in 1905, wanted to hear Coates perform the 'Three Holy Kings' scene from Wolfrum's Weihnachtsmysterium.Young 1955, 143. Gerontius was performed with the 1904 line-up under Henry Wood's direction in his 1906 season.Wood 1946, 205. Then Frederic Austin was Priest and Angel of the Agony to Coates's Soul at the Festivals of Southport (1906) and Birmingham (1909) and at Manchester (1908).M. Lee-Browne, Nothing so charming as Musick! (Thames, London 1999), 38. In 1907, in correspondence, Elgar wrote of him: "The Arch-chanter John was the greatest success and a joy to see."Young 1955, 173.
Classical-singing commentator Michael Scott (who, incidentally, calls Coates 'one of the finest English singers on record') notes in The Record of Singing that his repertoire was exceptionally wide-ranging and included Handel's Messiah and Belshazzar, Mendelssohn's St Paul and Elijah, Bach's St Matthew Passion, Elgar's King Olaf and Saint-Saëns's The Promised Land.M. Scott, The Record of Singing II (Duckworth, London 1979), 170-173. John Coates and Gervase Elwes were great friends, and Coates stood in for an indisposed Elwes on (at least) one occasion at Gloucester.W. & E. Elwes, Gervase Elwes, The Story of his Life (Grayson and Grayson, London 1935), 200-201. On another occasion, at 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.Elwes 1935, 210-212. Coates performed the Bach Mass in B minor in the April Festival of 1915 at Queen's Hall, under Henri Verbrugghen.Elkin 1944, 77.
War service and later career Coates then saw four years' war service in France as a captain in the Yorkshire Regiment (from 1916 to 1919).Eaglefield-Hull 1924; Davidson 1955. In March 1919, he signaled his return to music by giving the first of a long series of English-song recitals, with Anthony Bernard at the piano, at the Queen's Hall. His programs, his enjoyment of the work, his diction and characterization were intensely admired in them.R. Elkin 1944, 115.
In 1921, he appeared again in opera as Don José in Carmen and as Lohengrin for Carl Rosa at Covent Garden, but thereafter devoted most of his efforts to concert performance.Scott 1979, 171. In 1921 he sang Gerontius at the memorial meeting for Gervase Elwes at the Royal Albert Hall with the Royal Choral Society.Elwes 1935, 276-277. (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.')Elwes 1935, 276-277, 282. 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.Scott 1979, 171-172. In 1922 Roger Quilter, who had written much for Elwes and worked closely with him, dedicated his 'Morning song' (Thomas Heywood) to Coates, one of his most vibrant and characteristic miniatures, though Coates did not give the first performance of it.V. Langfield, Roger Quilter - His Life and Music (Boydell, Woodbridge 2002), 66, 148.