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Concerts

© Kaupo Kikkas

This is every performance of Coke's music that has so far been traced, from his schooldays at Eton in 1929 to the present, assembled from printed programmes, press notices, Radio Times billings, his mother's household accounts and the composer's own annotations. It is not a complete record and it cannot be: he was played most often in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, sometimes in a converted stable at his own house, and much of that went unreported. There is a gap of twenty-five years between 1987 and 2012 in which exactly one performance has been found. If you know of a concert that is missing, or have a programme, a cutting or a memory of hearing this music, please do get in touch.

1964

Concert

2nd September7.30pmElder Yard Schoolroom, Saltergate, Chesterfield

Performers
Brian Suter (tenor) Oliver Browett (violin) Richard Webb (cello) Roger Sacheverell Coke (piano)
Programme
Coke
Cello Sonata No. 2 in C, Op. 29
Svendsen
Romance
Hubay
Hejre Kati
Coke
Six Songs for soprano or tenor, Op. 19
Vieuxtemps
Reverie
Kreisler
Praeludium and Allegro
Coke
Elegiac Trio for piano, violin and cello in C minor, Op. 32
Notes
A recital in aid of Mencap, with programmes sold at half a crown. The printed programme gives: the Second Cello Sonata op. 29; violin solos by Svendsen and Hubay; the complete Six Songs op. 19; after the interval, violin solos by Vieuxtemps and Kreisler; and the Elegiac Trio op. 32. Coke's copy for the singer is inscribed by him 'For Brian'. Two letters from Coke arrange it. On 7 August 1964 he wrote to Brian Suter: 'I sent you a wire today saying they DO want the Songs with you at the Sept.2 Chesterfield concert (op.19, as before). I am so glad about this, as I have been wanting to do them with you again so very much... Will you do it for 5 guineas, as before?' A week later he settled the rehearsal: 'I think one run-through (much nearer the day) will be quite enough - only the first Song wasnt quite perfect.' The first of the two publications is unnamed, and ten report dates survive between them, so no date can be paired with a publication reliably.
Source
Printed programme, 2 September 1964 — Coke0013 Roger Sacheverell Coke to Brian Suter, 7 August 1964 — Coke0045 Roger Sacheverell Coke to Brian Suter, 14 August 1964 — Coke0046 Unknown publication
Provenance
Brian Suter: correspondence (Coke0045–Coke0048); Concert Programmes collection (Coke0113–Coke0141)

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