Collection Guide
Collection Title:
Collection Number:
Get Items:
Peter Yates Papers
MSS 0014
View entire collection guide
Search this collection
Table of contents
Title: Peter Yates Papers
Identifier/Call Number: MSS 0014
Contributing Institution:
Special Collections & Archives, UC San Diego
9500 Gilman Drive
La Jolla, California, 92093-0175
Languages:
English
Physical Description:
22.0 Linear feet
(47 archives boxes and 33 oversize folders)
Date (inclusive): 1927 - 1976
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. Also included in the collection are copies of scores by
composers Charles Ives, Lou Harrison, Ingolf Dahl, and typescripts of poems by Peyton Houston.
Creator:
Yates, Peter, 1909-1976
Scope and Content of Collection
The Peter Yates papers provide important documentation on contemporary musical activities in the mid-20th 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.
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.
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.
Publication rights are held by the creator of the collection.
Peter Yates Papers, MSS 0014. Special Collections & Archives, UC San Diego.
Acquired 1977, 1987.
Peter Yates Letters to Peyton Houston, MSS 662. Special Collections & Archives, UC San Diego.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Cage, John -- Correspondence
Evenings on the Roof (Concert series).
Harrison, Lou, 1917-2003 -- Correspondence
Houston, Peyton -- Correspondence
Ives, Charles, 1874-1954 -- Correspondence
Jarrell, Randall, 1914-1965 -- Correspondence
Johnson, Ronald, 1935-1998 -- Correspondence
Krenek, Ernst, 1900-1991 -- Correspondence
Mac Low, Jackson -- Correspondence
Moore, Marianne, 1887-1972 -- Correspondence
Niedecker, Lorine -- Correspondence
Partch, Harry, 1901-1974 -- Correspondence
Patchen, Kenneth, 1911-1972 -- Correspondence
Rexroth, Kenneth, 1905-1982 -- Correspondence
Reynolds, Roger, 1934- -- Correspondence
Rorem, Ned, 1923- -- Correspondence
Sandburg, Carl, 1878-1967 -- Correspondence
Schoenberg, Arnold, 1874-1951 -- Correspondence
Shapiro, Karl, 1913-2000 -- Correspondence
Thomson, Virgil, 1896-1989 -- Correspondence
Waldrop, Rosmarie -- Correspondence
Williams, Jonathan, 1929-2008 -- Correspondence
Yates, Frances Mullen -- Archives
Yates, Peter, 1909-1976 -- Archives
Young, La Monte -- Correspondence
Music -- 20th century