Edith Coates

Presenter0:00

This download is the only ex

Edith Coates0:02

Extract the BBC has of this edition of Desert Island Discs. The presenter was Roy Plumley.

Presenter0:08

Edith, what part of the country do you come from?

Edith Coates0:10

Lincoln. I'm what you call a Lincoln sheer yellow belly. Although

Edith Coates0:14

My family came from Yorkshire.

Presenter0:17

I've never heard that phrase Lincolnshire yellow belly before.

Presenter0:20

What's the origin of it?

Edith Coates0:21

I think it's the fish that are caught there.

Presenter0:24

Mm.

Edith Coates0:24

We've got yellow bellows, this.

Presenter0:26

Yeah.

Presenter0:27

Do you come from a musical family?

Edith Coates0:29

I don't think so really, although my father and his brothers sang in choirs, and uh one at Ely Cathedral.

Presenter0:37

Yes. I know you won a scholarship to Trinity College of Music very early.

Edith Coates0:41

Yes, there was thirteen.

Presenter0:42

The um

Presenter0:43

At thirty for singing.

Edith Coates0:45

Yes. I had then a deep contralto voice, what some people call a low woman's voice.

Presenter0:51

Already at 30.

Edith Coates0:53

Yeah.

Edith Coates0:54

Yes.

Presenter0:55

What was your very first professional engagement?

Edith Coates0:58

I went from Audison to Lillian Baileys.

Presenter1:00

At the old page

Edith Coates1:00

Yes, at the old vicar. Yes. And uh I went in the Midsummer Night's Dream to do a singing fairy.

Presenter1:06

Can you have

Edith Coates1:06

And then I went into the chorus.

Presenter1:09

Now remembering something of the set up of those days at the Old Vig Opera Company, how much money we were getting.

Edith Coates1:09

They're a real

Edith Coates1:14

Oh, very little. About a pound a week, I think.

Presenter1:18

You said you'd started as a as a a deep contralto. Your voice surely didn't stay there.

Edith Coates1:24

No. I went higher to a mezzo or dramatic

Presenter1:28

Yeah.

Edith Coates1:28

Soprano

Presenter1:29

Let's have another record. Watch number three.

Edith Coates1:32

Midsummer Night's Dream.

Presenter1:33

Yes.

Edith Coates1:35

I think that will remind me.

Edith Coates1:37

of the days when I played one of the singing fairies, the old Vic and Robert Atkins production.

Presenter1:40

Yeah.

Edith Coates1:46

He called out from the front.

Edith Coates1:48

when we gallumps on to the stage.

Edith Coates1:50

Call yourselves fairies. You're more like a lot of bloody coal heavers.

Presenter1:53

Like a lot of

Presenter1:56

Yes, I can just imagine him saying it. Now, you were singing principal roles with the Thick Wells Opera Company.

Presenter2:03

Very hard work in those days. Do you remember any particular occasion that stands out as?

Presenter2:08

An extraordinary day in your life.

Presenter2:11

When I was

Edith Coates2:11

Doing Trovatore.

Edith Coates2:14

A comic incident.

Presenter2:16

What was that?

Edith Coates2:16

When the cat went across the stage, the tenor got up from the ground and took it off stage.

Presenter2:23

The people.

Edith Coates2:23

The people roared.

Presenter2:25

It was in the um Olvic days of the opera that you met your husband, Paul Lloyd.

Presenter2:31

When did you first sing at Covent Garden?

Edith Coates2:34

When I did Hansen and Gretel.

Edith Coates2:38

I had to do a show at the Wells in the afternoon.

Edith Coates2:41

And then a call came from Covent Garden, could I sing it in the evening? Because the principal and the understudy were ill.

Presenter2:49

Uh

Edith Coates2:49

Singing what? The mother? The mother. Yes, the mother in handsome griddle.

Presenter2:52

And you had sung it at the Wells in the end.

Edith Coates2:53

In the battery and they asked me if I could do it in the evening.

Edith Coates2:57

And Sir Thomas Peter came before the curtain and he said, We're glad to have found a mother from another institution to do it for us.

Edith Coates3:07

Surely at the garden they'd be singing it in German. Yes, they were. I sang it in English.

Presenter3:13

What other roles did you sing at the Royal Opera House?

Edith Coates3:19

At Cucena in Trovatori.

Presenter3:21

Yes.

Edith Coates3:22

Amneris

Edith Coates3:24

In Aida

Edith Coates3:25

Oh, everything. In Grimes, Auntie in Grimes.

Presenter3:30

During the war, of course, our National Opera House, to our our shame, became a dance hall. What happened to you during the war?

Edith Coates3:36

Oh, we went on tour. Mm-mm.

Edith Coates3:39

Lots of blitz. Everywhere we went we were blitzed nearly.

Presenter3:42

Yes. And I well, the train calls must have real

Edith Coates3:46

Bye.

Presenter3:47

Real misery.

Edith Coates3:47

They're waiting about on stations.

Presenter3:50

This was for the big world.

Edith Coates3:51

Yes.

Presenter3:52

Did it wear overseas with it?

Edith Coates3:54

Uh

Presenter3:54

Yeah.

Edith Coates3:54

Sweet.

Presenter3:54

Yeah. Uh

Edith Coates3:54

Yeah.

Presenter3:54

Uh

Edith Coates3:55

to sing to the troops on Enza.

Presenter3:57

And after the war

Edith Coates3:59

After the war I went to the garden.

Edith Coates4:01

And uh had a contract there.

Presenter4:03

Yes. You were the first post-war comment.

Edith Coates4:06

First one, I opened the season. Yes, with Carmen.

Presenter4:10

Have you kept record of how many commons you sung?

Edith Coates4:13

Ugh.

Edith Coates4:14

No, but it must be hundreds.

Presenter4:17

How many operatic roles have you got in your repertoire?

Edith Coates4:20

I think we're about sixty or seventy minutes.

Presenter4:23

Which is your favorite? Which do you look forward to singing most?

Edith Coates4:27

Certainly not calming.

Edith Coates4:29

Because I have a recurrent dream that I'm going on for Carmen.

Presenter4:33

Yeah.

Edith Coates4:33

I find it's not true and I'm so relieved.

Presenter4:37

Yeah.

Edith Coates4:38

But I think it's a touchener.

Presenter4:38

Mm-hmm.

Presenter4:40

You've sung in quite a few British operas. You mentioned um Peter Grimes.

Edith Coates4:44

Yes.

Edith Coates4:45

Lovely opera, I think it's great. And The Midsummer Marys by Tippett. Yes. And uh

Edith Coates4:51

The Beggars' Opera by Benjamin Britton.

Presenter4:54

You sang in an American musical some years ago.

Edith Coates4:56

Yes, Com De, by Leonard Bernstein.

Presenter4:59

Mm-hmm.

Presenter5:01

A disappointing run.

Edith Coates5:02

Of course we had terrifically hot weather then for one thing against it I should think.

Presenter5:07

How recently you've been appearing as guest artist with the Saddler's Worlds Company at the Coliseum.

Edith Coates5:14

The Countess, Queen of Spade of Europe

Presenter5:15

It is.

Edith Coates5:16

Mm.

Presenter5:17

And we saw you on television not long ago?

Edith Coates5:19

Yes, the gondoliers.

Presenter5:20

Yes. Was that a new departure, Gilbert and Sullivan, or

Edith Coates5:23

Yes for me. Although I might have gone into it at one time, I nearly got a contract to do it instead of going into opera.

Edith Coates5:31

I'm so glad I didn't.