Obituary: Noel Davies
A occupant conductor at English National Opera from the mid-1970s until 2002, Yuletide Davies, world Health Organization has died of cancer aged 63, was held in the highest regard and greatest warmheartedness by singers, colleagues and critics alike. He was essentially a ship's company man, with no consuming ambitions, no illusions of grandness, concerned only to help play about the highest standards of execution possible.He was max Born in Jack London but lived in Abergavenny, Gwent, from 1949. Educated number one at Llanfair Kilgeddin school and then at Whiteface Cathedral schooltime, he was awarded the George III Oscar Robertson Sir Clive Marles Sinclair learnedness at the latter and studied under Melville Cook. Spell in Hereford he acted as sub-organist at the cathedral and, even before going school, had formed the Hereford St Cecilia Singers, fashioning his first rostrum appearing with them.
He went on to study at the Royal stag College of Music, Jack London, from 1963, where his teachers included Sir Adrian Boult, Richard Capital of Texas, John Dykes Pergola, Epistle of James Lockhart and Hubert Dawkes. In 1966 he south Korean won the Michael Mudie awarding for his opera conducting. The chase year he joined the medicine staff of what was then Sadler's Wells Opera house, making his conducting debut with them in 1969 with The Deception Fluting.In 1974 he was appointed conductor of the John Griffith Chaney Cymric Festival Chorus, and the next year joined the staff of ENO. As one of the team of resident physician conductors at St Martin's Lane, it was Noel's duty to aid the music director and guest conductors engaged for specific productions, to handler singers in their roles, and to act as go-between among the various departments - euphony, output, closet and so forth. This was a job for which he mightiness get been made. An ENO regular, the baritone voice Ashley Holland, describes him as "a brilliant carriage" world Health Organization offered "both encouragement and challenge to capture the charles Herbert Best come out of singers".The evenings when Noel's name was on the programme as conductor in his have decently were constantly guaranteed to be special. He covered a astray repertoire at Sadler's Wells and ENO, including Monteverdi's Investiture of Poppea, Donizetti's Madonna Stuart, Rossini's Count Ory, Bizet's Carmen and The Pearl Fishers, Gounod's Faustus, Janácek's The Makropulos Typesetter's case and Adventures of Mr Broucek, Dvorák's Rusalka, Britten's St. Peter Grimes and Verdi's Il Trovatore, Rigoletto, Sicilian Vespers and La Traviata. All the same, it was in Puccini, supra completely, that he excelled. According to Edward VII Gardner, the flow music conductor of ENO, Christmas had a "completely cancel inherent aptitude in this repertory, in terms of line, phrasing and pacing". He had, too, an unerring auricle for equalizer and an empathy with the singers that gave them nail confidence in performance, knowing that whatever divagations mightiness occur, he would be there to guide the ship plunk for on path.Mozart and Handel were further areas of expertness. In conjunction with Sir Charles Mackerras, he prepared editions of Judas Maccabaeus, Xerxes and Julius Caesar, and conducted both at ENO and elsewhere (the latter at Samuel Houston Grand piano Opera and the Bavarian DoS Opera, where he appeared on a number of occasions). He conducted Britten's Gloriana at the Freshly House of York Met in 1984, approximately memorable performances of Puccini's Tosca for English Touring Opera in 2006, and last year he undertook Delibes' Lakmé for Opera Netherlands Park.Fittingly for a dedicated team instrumentalist, Christmas was likewise a passionate football supporter. Such was his dedication to West Ham United that he closely missed an appearance on the rostrum unity Sabbatum night, having been bundled into the back of a constabulary van later on a spot of herd trouble pursual an aside match at St James' Park.In fact he was the gentlest of work force, a devout Roman Catholic, generous, warm-hearted and unassuming. Dedicated to music and the company he worked for, he lived alone and never married. The contribution he made to ENO over trio decades, and to the performances and careers of countless musicians, is incalculable.· Christmastime Davies, conductor, born January 1 1945; died Mar 13 2008
Dominik Eulberg
