Coates, Albert

Born Apr. 23,1882, in St. Petersburg; died Dec. 11, 1953, in Milnerton, near Cape Town. British conductor and composer.

Coates completed his musical education at the Leipzig Conservatory. He was a pupil and assistant of A. Nikisch. He made his debut as an opera conductor in Leipzig and worked in the opera houses of Elberfeld, Dresden, and Mannheim (1906–10). During 1911–19 he was the conductor of the Mariinskii Theatre in St. Petersburg (Petrograd), where he staged many Russian operas. In 1913 he was a guest conductor at Covent Garden in London; he moved to London in 1919 and conducted opera and symphonic works.

Coates taught at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester (USA) during 1923–25 and conducted the Eastman orchestra. He toured the USA and the major music centers of Europe. He often performed in the USSR (for the first time in 1926). In 1946 he moved to South Africa, where he directed the Johannesburg Symphony and taught at the University of Cape Town.

Coates was an outstanding interpreter of many classic Russian operas, the works of A. N. Scriabin, and the operas of R. Wagner. He composed several operas, the symphonic poem The Eagle, piano pieces, and songs.