from the Central Hall, Liverpool
Florence Austral (soprano)
Vera de Villars (soprano)
The Liverpool
Philharmonic Orchestra
Leader, Alfred Barker
Conducted by Albert Coates
WAGNER
Prelude to Lohengrin
The Waltraute Scene (Gotterdammerung)
(Briinnhilde, FLORENCE AUSTRAL)
(Waltraute, VERA DE VILLARS)
Good Friday Music (Parsifal) Finale (Gotterdammerung)
(Soloist, FLORENCE AUSTRAL)
In European centres of music and in America Albert Coates's engagements as guest conductor are frequent ; in consequence, it is only on rare occasions that we get the opportunity of hearing him either in London or in the provinces.
He studied conducting and gained his experience abroad, particularly as second conductor to Nikisch, whose pupil for a time he was. Thereafter, in the opera houses of Germany and Russia he acquired a very thorough knowledge of the operatic repertory, and when he was thirty-one he came to London and shared with Nikisch the conductorship of the Wagner operas in that brilliant season of 1913. Since that date, interrupted by the War, he has been one of the most prominent of British conductors both here and abroad.