OTD in early British television: 14 January 1939
John Wyver writes: the afternoon of Saturday 14 January at 3.30pm saw the second presentation of what was now, given the timing of the the transmission, somewhat incongruously named Schubert Night. I previously noted the first broadcast on 9 January, but it is worth returning to the programme as it is an ambitious early performance and drama hybrids about the life and work of a composer. Moreover, it was written and produced by the intriguing figure of Philip Bate.
The script touched on key events in the life of Franz Schubert (1797-1828, above), and the cast, led by Harold Child as the composer, were expected to contribute musically as well as in the drama sections. Australian baritone and D’Oyly Carte regular Max Oldaker played Schubert’s friend Johann Michael Vogl and sang ‘The Trout’ and a ‘Serenade’. Accomplished dancer Vera Lavrova, given a role identified as ‘Hostess’ child’, performed two dances in a sequence of some of the Schubert’s best-known compositions.
The immensely versatile BBC Television Orchestra provided the musical backbone under conductor Hyam ‘Bumps’ Greenbaum. This was a full-time band of 22 hard-working musicians at Alexandra Palace who at a moment’s notice had to turn their talents from variety to Wagner, music-hall to Mendelssohn. Complementing the orchestra on this occasion was a quartet of singers which included the celebrated Welsh baritone Roderick Jones and tenor Harold Bradbury.
A remarkably versatile musician, conductor and music director, Greenbaum had worked with the Diaghilev Ballet and with revue producer Charles Cochran. He was married to harpist Sidonie Goossens, who also made regular appearances at AP, and he was a close friend to many of the major composers of the day, including William Walton, Arnold Bax and Alan Rawsthorne. But when the war came and the orchestra was disbanded, he moved to Wales where, already a heavy drinker, and now disappointed and depressed, he died aged 41 from alcohol-related problems.
Philip Bate joined the BBC Music department in 1934 and worked initially in audio balance-and-control for the 30-line tlevision transmissions from the studio in Portland Place. In his invaluable 1950 book Adventure in Vision, John Swift offers a snapshot of him at this time:
Bate, armed with a microphone lashed with string or wire to the end of a long bamboo pole, spent most of his time crawling about on his hands and knees in an attempt to keep out of vision and at the same time holding the microphone in the right place – not too near the artist, not too far from the piano – a feat that was largely a matter of guesswork.
Having transferred across to AP, Bate began to experiment with the visual presentation of music was constantly experimenting with the visual, often innovating with the use of superimposition of two or more camera channels. John Swift again, writing of a Bate-produced presentation that predated Schubert Night:
On the basis that sight and sound are complementary, he took a simple, clearly shaped tune, Bach’s ‘Air on a G String’ from the ‘Suite in D’, and then [designer] Peter Bax selected for vision a number of abstract forms from Gothic architecture — arches, columns, capitals and so on. On the screen a pattern could be watched which grew and developed with the music. Each fresh form appeared exactly at the point where a new musical phrase came in. It was a parallel experience for the eye and the ear.
Margaret Campbell took up the story in her 1999 obituary of Bate for the Independent:
When the Second World War came, he failed a medical for the RAF but found himself in military censorship. The BBC soon recalled him and he became involved in a number of projects including announcing dance bands and producing the legendary percussionist James Blades in his famous drumbeat, the symbol of European resistance.
After the war, Bate became a music producer in television in the live series The Conductor Speaks, in which Sir Henry Wood, Sir Malcolm Sargent, Sir Thomas Beecham and Leopold Stokowsky all took part. The Edinburgh Festival also came within his province. He developed a keen interest in ballet… [and] he was also instrumental in bringing the Paris Opera Ballet to Britain for the first time in its history.
Throughout his time at the BBC, and after his retirement in 1968, he studied and acquired musical instruments. Helen La Rue’s Guardian obituary explained what happened to the more than 300 precious pieces he acquired:
By the mid-1960s the collection covered the history of woodwind from 1680, as well as brass instruments and an important collection of printed instrument tutors. Bate was convinced it had a purpose concerned with the interpretation of music, and that provided the instruments were maintained, they could be used. In 1968 he presented the collection to Oxford university, with the proviso that it be used for teaching and had its own specialist lecturer-curator.
Today, the Bate Collection remains an integral part of the Faculty of Music at the university:
The Collection is made available for study, research and judicious use by scholars, students, makers, and players, so as to enhance and increase the knowledge of the history of music as well as the enjoyment of historic performance for all. The Bate Collection is a unique resource in the national and international landscape. Music students in our Faculty can benefit from visiting the Collection, studying the archival material related to these instruments, and playing the instruments themselves.
Image: a 1825 watercolour of Schubert by Wilhelm August Rieder.
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