Eric Coates (1886-1957)
Orchestral Works

Light music's golden years were during the first half of the twentieth century. Of the countless composers who wrote for the middlebrow listeners of seaside and festival orchestras, salon groups, café orchestras and broadcasting light orchestras, the name Eric Coates stands out as a master composer of beautiful melodies and wonderful orchestrations enhanced with a refinement, sophistication and truly symphonic orchestral sense that few light-music composers could match.

Born in Nottinghamshire in 1886, Coates had a pedigree classical training at the Royal Academy of Music, with Frederick Corder for composition and Lionel Tertis for viola. He became a freelance viola player, rising to principal viola of Henry Wood's Queen's Hall Orchestra in 1913, where no doubt he would have played in many first British performances. He left in 1919 to dedicate his lime to composing songs and light music, writing (in all)