Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
Peter Yates Papers
MSS 0014
No online items
View entire collection guide
Search this collection
Table of contents
Creator:
Yates, Peter, 1909-
Title: Peter Yates Papers,
Date (inclusive): 1927 - 1976
Extent:
22.10 linear feet
(48 archives boxes and 33 oversize folders)
Abstract: Papers of a music critic, author, teacher, and poet, who championed modern avant-garde music, presented a series of chamber
concerts in Los Angeles called "Evenings on the Roof," and headed the music department at Buffalo State University. The materials
consist largely of correspondence and drafts of original writings. Included among the correspondence are letters from many
key figures in 20th century music, including composers John Cage, Lou Harrison, Charles Ives, Ernst Krenek, Harry Partch,
Roger Reynolds, Arnold Schoenberg, Virgil Thomson, pianist John Kirkpatrick, and poets Ronald Johnson, Marianne Moore, Lorine
Niedecker, Kenneth Patchen, Kenneth Rexroth, Carl Sandburg, and Karl Shapiro. Original writings included drafts of articles,
plays, poetry, drama, and books, including Yates' two major works An Amateur at the Keyboard (1964) and Twentieth Century
Music (1967). Also included in the collection are copies of scores by composers Charles Ives, Lou Harrison, Ingolf Dahl,
and typescripts of poems by Peyton Houston.
Repository:
University of California, San Diego. Geisel Library. Mandeville Special Collections Library.
La Jolla, California 92093-0175
Collection number: MSS 0014
Language of Material:
Collection materials in English
Collection is open for research.
Not Available
Peter Yates Papers, MSS 0014. Mandeville Special Collections Library, UCSD.
Publication rights are held by the creator of the collection.
Peter B. Yates, music critic, author, teacher, and poet, was born in Toronto on November 30, 1909. His parents were U.S.
citizens, and he attended Ridley and Union colleges in New York State. He received his B.A. from Princeton University in
1931. In 1933 Yates married the pianist Frances Mullen. After migrating to the West Coast, Yates went to work for the California
Department of Employment in Los Angeles in 1937. He stayed with the agency as an employment counselor until 1962.
In 1939 Peter and Frances Yates began a series of chamber music concerts in their Los Angeles home. The series took place
in an attic-like room and eventually came to be known as "Evenings on the Roof." The programs featured contemporary music
in combination with more traditional works, and many of the performers and composers were important figures in the Los Angeles
avant-garde music scene. The series was later moved to other locations and evolved into the "Monday Evening Concerts" at
the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. These concerts gained a national reputation for presenting the works of 20th century
composers such as Igor Stravinsky, John Cage, and Lou Harrison. Yates retired as director of the series in 1954.
Yates was involved in many other music-related activities while in Los Angeles. He served as music critic for the magazine
Arts and Architecture and presented numerous lectures on musical subjects. One of Yates' more memorable presentations, given
in San Francisco in 1964 and elsewhere, involved a multi-media event which included projected images, tape recorded conversations,
and a performance of a Bach chaconne on a frying pan. In this and other lectures, Yates inspired his audiences to approach
music from new perspectives. He brought his ideas to the air waves in a series of radio broadcasts on the Los Angeles station
KPFK.
In 1964 Yates received a Ford Foundation grant that enabled him to travel and visit various composers and poets. In 1968
he was appointed the head of the music department at Buffalo State College (later the State University of New York at Buffalo).
This was an unusual appointment, since Yates held only a Bachelor's degree and was not a performer or composer. At Buffalo
Yates championed the cause of contemporary music and arranged many concerts of the works of living composers. He taught a
course and led a seminar on the art of criticism, and he presented a series of weekly radio programs on the campus station
WBFO. His wife gave many piano recitals, often performing the works of Charles Ives, her specialty.
Peter Yates died in Buffalo in 1976. He left an important body of published criticism and poetry. Among his most significant
works are An Amateur at the Keyboard (1964) and Twentieth Century Music (1967). In An Amateur at the Keyboard Yates advocated
a return to direct involvement in music-making by non-professionals. Such an involvement, he felt, would be an improvement
over the passive appreciation of music through concerts and recordings, and it would restore a dying tradition of amateur
musicianship that flourished in the 18th century and earlier. In Twentieth Century Music Yates helped to explain the genesis
of contemporary compositions and instructed his readers on how to appreciate the works. A collection of Yates' poetry was
published in 1946 under the title A SMALLER POEM BOOK.
Scope and Content of Collection
The Peter Yates papers provide important documentation on contemporary musical activities in the mid-twentieth century United
States, and on the career of a perceptive interpreter of those activities. The materials date mostly from the 1950s through
the 1970s and consist largely of correspondence and drafts of Yates's writings. The collection is arranged in eight series:
1) CORRESPONDENCE, 2) WRITINGS, 3) PROGRAMS AND PAMPHLETS REGARDING PETER YATES, 4) MISCELLANY, 5) FRANCES MULLEN YATES MATERIALS,
6) PEYTON HOUSTON MATERIALS, 7) PROGRAMS AND PAMPHLETS COLLECTED BY YATES, and 8) OVERSIZE MATERIALS.
The CORRESPONDENCE is quite extensive. Represented are many important figures in the world of twentieth-century music, including
Milton Babbitt, John Cage, Henry and Sidney Cowell, Ingolf Dahl, Lukas Foss, Lou Harrison, Peyton Houston, Alan Hovhaness,
Charles Ives, pianist John Kirkpatrick, William Kraft, Ernst Krenek, Toshiro Mayazumi, Harry Partch, Roger Reynolds, Wallingford
Riegger, Ned Rorem, Arnold Schoenberg, Virgil Thomson, Edgar Varese, and a note from conductor Bruno Walter. Also included
is correspondence with poets Ronald Johnson, Marianne Moore, Lorine Neidecker, Kenneth Patchen, Kenneth Rexroth, Carl Sandburg,
and Karl Shapiro.
The correspondence with composer Lou Harrison is a very important part of the collection, since Harrison was a close friend
of the Yates. Other materials relating to Harrison, including scores of some of his works, can be found in the series OVERSIZE
MATERIALS.
Another significant and extensive group of materials is the correspondence between Yates and Melissa and Charles Levitzky.
The Levitzky correspondence is very personal in nature, and Yates often enclosed drafts of his poetry in his letters to the
couple.
The CORRESPONDENCE is arranged in alphabetical order by the name of the correspondent or the subject. Thereunder the materials
are arranged chronologically.
The series WRITINGS is also extensive. It is subdivided into sections containing drafts of articles, short stories, books,
plays, and program material. In general, the materials are arranged alphabetically by title. The poetry, most of which is
in manuscript form, is largely unarranged due to the difficulty in determining titles or chronology. Published versions of
the magazine articles can be found at the end of the series, arranged chronologically.
PROGRAMS AND PAMPHLETS REGARDING PETER YATES document Yates' lectures, radio broadcasts, concerts which he produced, and other
events in his career.
Among the MISCELLANY are miscellaneous notes by Yates on a variety of subjects. Also included here are notes taken from an
interview of conductor Bruno Walter.
The small group of FRANCES MULLEN YATES MATERIALS relate to the wife of Peter Yates. Included here are Ms. Yates' music copy
books. Ms. Yates' personal scores for the works of Charles Ives can be found in OVERSIZE MATERIALS.
The PEYTON HOUSTON MATERIALS include typescripts of original poetry and mimeographs of manuscripts, some of which contain
holograph annotations.
OVERSIZE MATERIALS include scores of works by composers Ingolf Dahl, Lou Harrison, Charles Ives, and Johann Sebastian Bach.
Many of these scores are mimeograph copies of original manuscripts. The Lou Harrison materials include prose and poetry pieces
by the composer. The Bach materials consist of transcriptions of organ works made by Wesley Kuhnle, a close friend of Peter
Yates and a builder of keyboard instruments.
Also included in OVERSIZE MATERIALS is a scrapbook of Yates' writings on music, titled "The Lay Listener;" publicity materials
for the Evenings on the Roof series; and copies of the Union College literary magazine, which contains early writings of Peter
Yates.
Listening copies of the sound recordings, which were acquired with the Yates papers, are available in the Music Library.
A list of recordings is attached to this register. The originals, from which these copies were made, are stored in Special
Collections.
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.
Yates, Peter, 1909- -- Archives
Yates, Frances Mullen -- Archives
Music -- 20th century
Houston, Peyton, -- correspondent
Cage, John, -- correspondent
Harrison, Lou, 1917-2003 -- correspondent
Ives, Charles, 1874-1954, -- correspondent
Krenek, Ernst, 1900-1991, -- correspondent
Partch, Harry, 1901-1974, -- correspondent
Reynolds, Roger, 1934- -- correspondent
Schoenberg, Arnold, 1874-1951, -- correspondent
Thomson, Virgil, 1896-1989 -- correspondent
Johnson, Ronald, 1935- -- correspondent
Moore, Marianne, 1887-1972, -- correspondent
Niedecker, Lorine, -- correspondent
Patchen, Kenneth, 1911-1972, -- correspondent
Rexroth, Kenneth, 1905- -- correspondent
Sandburg, Carl, 1878-1967, -- correspondent
Shapiro, Karl Jay, 1913-2000 -- correspondent
Jarrell, Randall, 1914-1965, -- correspondent
Mac Low, Jackson, -- correspondent
Rorem, Ned, 1923- -- correspondent
Waldrop, Rosmarie, -- correspondent
Williams, Jonathan, 1929- -- correspondent
Young, La Monte, -- correpondent