In Memory of John Bates

Occasionally my village makes me very, very proud. Not often mind, just occasionally. And sending off one of the village’s most lovable rogues was without a doubt one of those moments. You couldn’t spend any time in The Bell in Tanworth in Arden without running into John Bates, a man with a wicked sense of humour, a sometimes remarkably dirty mind but without a doubt a genius in his own right. His enthusiasm, liturgical knowledge, musical abilities, quick wit and instinctive care for others made him feature of the village who will be truly missed.

There’s only one thing voluntary about this choir and that’s joining it.

In my many years of choral experience I don’t believe you can say truer than that. I can well remember the day that John first grabbed me for the church choir; I was about nine years old singing in the school choir during something at the church. At the end of the service John made a bee line for my mother and started talking enthusiastically about what a fantastic experience joining the church choir would be for me. I’m not entirely sure it was voluntary on my part but I soon found myself enrolled and working through the medals system with the children’s choir. I’ve gained several awards past the dark blue now, but I think my proudest moment in the choir personally would have to be passing that examination knowing that I was in front of someone who knew darn well what I could do and expecting my best. But he took a keen interest in my results from the other examinations and made me chuckle when he looked at my Provost’s award score and said ‘You did well to get a Merit off that bugger, he’s tighter than a nat’s arse.’

Most of what I know about singing chorally I learned from him, the only aspect that he could never get me to understand was theory but to be fair neither has anyone else. Balance, harmony and the right blend of voices was important, but so was the understanding of what you were singing both musically and as part of worship. He is the only organist in my experience who got a round of applause without fail after each evensong, not because the playing was note perfect but because of the enthusiasm and real feeling that you could sense in his playing. That often meant far more than any amount of technically perfect playing. When put together with his often joked about turbo setting on the organ he embodied the enthusiasm that it would be a pleasure to see in more Christian worship.