Stanley Bate

[Pengelli]

Stanley Bate's Symphony No 3 is featured as a new cd release on
the Dutton website,if anyone doesn't already know.

[Pengelli]

It is coupled with Erik Chisholm: Pictures by Dante and some short pieces by Richard Arnell.

[Gareth Vaughan]

May be this post should be in New Recordings.

[Mark Thomas]

Indeed it should, Gareth!

[Pengelli]

My sincere apologies for this. My excitement at seeing the cd got the better of me.

[Mark Thomas]

No need to apologise Pengelli. It's no problem.

[Pengelli]

Thank you,Mark. Re: Bate. His music is romantic & lyrical,so I do
feel it fits in here,in the right part of the forum,of course!

[Pengelli]

I wonder whether Bate's name went against him. Nothing wrong with it,really,but it's so homely (Hovis) and un-exotic sounding?

[thalbergmad]

I wonder if he was called Stratislav Batesov whether his works would be played more often. Would not be the first composer to change his name.

Eli Parish and Leon Dudley seemed initially to have a "Hovis" feel to them.

Thal

[Pengelli]

William Brian,Edwin Yorke Bowen & a certain,Joseph Holbrooke
spring to mind. Not so extreme;but it didn't seem to help much!

[chill319]

Re Bates' name: Remember the old Joe Green/Giuseppe Verdi bit? I wonder, too, if "Stanley" has aesthetic or class associations in Britain? Would "Stanley Beethoven" sound promising? Even with Mozart we usually prefer Amadeus to Gottlieb.

[albion]

   

... a worthless piece of undistinguished pastiche ... Bate's mind is totally devoid of distinction - 1953 BBC criticism of the Violin Concerto No. 3 Op. 58 (1947/50). 

With Piano Concertos 2 and 3 also available in the broadcast archive, the above assessment beggars belief.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Code Select Expand

.. a worthless piece of undistinguished pastiche ... Bate's mind is totally devoid of distinction - 1953 BBC criticism of the Violin Concerto No. 3 Op. 58 (1947/50).  ???

Why are you surprised? This classic piece of bigotted claptrap issued from the BBC!!!

[Pengelli]

Back again,I'm afraid! Lot's of very fascinating postings on this forum as usual,I see.
Thanks for the Bate excerpts Albion & the other forum user who supplied them. I can't wait to hear some of this on a nice shiny Dutton cd,complete with their usual striking choice of artwork on the front! The Piano Concerto's certainly sound well worth Dutton's time & money to my ears. By the way,who was that BBC nonentity anyway?
  Strangest of the archive contributions so far,have to be the Gaze Cooper excerpts. There's allot of ambient atmosphere there;for a moment I wondered if the performance would ever get going. Is this from  a privately recorded source? Unfortunately, the sound quality and performances don't really do much to further the extremely neglected Gaze Cooper's cause and I will defer judgement until Cooper get's a fairer hearing! But thank you very much to whoever provided these snippets. Preserving this kind of material is what music appreciation is all about.

[albion]

Despite having had it on the 'wanted' list for a whole year, I've only just got round to the Dutton recording of Stanley Bate's Symphony No.4 - what a terrific piece it is, and clearly by the same hand as the superb 3rd (which indicates to me that this composer had an individual voice). What had put me off purchasing slightly was the coupling - a 'realisation' of Symphony No.7 by Richard Arnell (whose Symphonies 1-6 I greatly admire). I needn't have worried - Martin Yates has done a fabulous job of melding the composer's unfinished sketches together (he was in close consultation with Arnell shortly before the latter's death in 2009) and this proves a very fitting and poignant conclusion to a highly impressive symphonic career.



Having got to know Bate's Piano Concerto No.2 from the composer's own performance, I am more than usually excited at the prospect of hearing Victor Sangiorgio tackle the virtuosic Allegro di bravura first movement - a veritable moto perpetuo whirlwind of notes. The Sinfonietta No.1 will be completely new to virtually every listener on the planet (including me) - so this is really a disc to savour, and hopefully will lead to several more of Bate's concertos (and possibly ballet scores) reaching the studio.