Hattogate

[Scott]

I hope this article hasn't already been posted in the previous incarnation of the GMG. It's by cellist Julian Lloyd Webber and appears in The Telegraph (UK):

The fallout from the greatest classical music scam ever perpetrated has been immense, writes Julian Lloyd Webber

It is unfortunate that it takes either seriously enhanced breasts or seriously advanced fraud for a classical music story to make it to the news pages of our enlightened media.

More than enough has been written about "Hattogate" already, but - along with the world and his dog - I thought I would throw in my two penn'orth before the sordid saga is relegated to the footnote of classical recording history where it belongs.

Given the right director, Hattogate has the makings of an excellent noir melodrama, so here is its synopsis: born in 1928, Joyce Hatto was a more or less unknown British pianist who "retired" from the concert platform she so seldom graced in 1976.

Many years later, recordings, allegedly by Hatto and allegedly recorded "at home" on her Steinway piano, began to emerge on her husband's Concert Artists label - although it was never convincingly explained how Hatto had managed to fit entire symphony orchestras into her lounge.

By the time of her death last year, no fewer than 104 "Hatto" discs had been released, garnering rave reviews and transforming the barely known ivory-tinkler into a cult heroine. There was just one problem: the recordings weren't hers.

Twenty years before her "retirement" Hatto had married W Barrington-Coupe, a record "mogul" who specialised in setting up labels whose distinguishing feature was to issue recordings by orchestras and conductors that didn't exist. The highlight of Hatto's pre-"retirement" career came in 1970 - a recording of Bax's Symphonic Variations for Piano and Orchestra with the Guildford Philharmonic under the distinguished conductor Vernon Handley. Paid for by Barrington-Coupe, it appeared on one of his labels, Revolution.

Handley remembers: "The Bax recording was very, very difficult indeed, one of the hardest recordings of my 179 discs- she couldn't really play rhythmically."

According to Barrington-Coupe, Hatto was already suffering from ovarian cancer and went "straight from the studios to hospital for surgery", a story contradicted by the consultant radiologist who eventually did care for Hatto: "She was first treated for ovarian cancer in 1992 and had no previous history of the disease," he recalled, before adding: "She had chips on her shoulder. She thought there were 'flavours of the month' and that some people's faces didn't fit - I used to hear 15 or 20 minutes of this every six weeks."

The radiologist also remembered that "she had incredible strength and stamina and she looked stunning". This last remark casts doubt on the couple's assertion that Hatto had withdrawn from public performance because a critic had suggested it was "impolite to look ill on stage". (No trace of this review has ever been found.)

In the end, Hatto was literally "digitally challenged" when one of "her" recordings was identified by iTunes as someone else's - because the timings of the tracks were identical to the recording they had copied.

The fallout from the greatest classical music scam ever perpetrated has been immense. Critics who reviewed her discs stand accused of being gullible. "One of the greatest pianists Britain has ever produced," swooned a Hatto obituary in the Guardian. "Hatto must be the greatest living pianist that almost no one has ever heard of," gushed Richard Dyer in the Boston Globe. Yet, apart from doing a John Prescott with the English language, I don't see why Dyer - or any critic who reviewed a Hatto disc in good faith - should be admonished.

There are those who are saying Hattogate is a human tragedy: an attempt by a loving husband to console his dying wife. Rubbish. Lots of people (my mother included) suffer terminal illness without pilfering other people's hard work.

Hatto and Barrington-Coupe were thoroughly dishonest, and Barrington-Coupe should be forced to face the music his wife lacked the talent to make.

[Don]

There are those who are saying Hattogate is a human tragedy: an attempt by a loving husband to console his dying wife. Rubbish. Lots of people (my mother included) suffer terminal illness without pilfering other people's hard work.

Hatto and Barrington-Coupe were thoroughly dishonest, and Barrington-Coupe should be forced to face the music his wife lacked the talent to make.

So true.  Barrington-Coupe's "human tragedy" story is garbage.  He's just a two-bit crook unable to cover his tracks.

[Drasko]

Amazing 

Hatto Hexameron

[Brian]

Wow, fascinating analysis, now I will listen.

Did anyone ever figure out who did Hatto's Schubert?

[Harry Collier]

Wow, fascinating analysis, now I will listen.

Did anyone ever figure out who did Hatto's Schubert?

I also would like to know this. I have a couple of "Hatto" Schubert Cds and rate them very highly.

[Holden]

The one things that does come out of this is Barrington-Coupe's ability to pick out some excellent piano playing from virtually unknown pianists and this is where the classical music world lets itself down very badly. The majority of the 'influential' critics have never been professional musicians yet their opinions tend to hold sway and that has always bothered me. The Tom Deacons (what a nasty man he is) of this world make a proclamation and thus, a new star in the pianistic firmament is created. This star is invariably MOR in both talent and interpretation and their one saving grace is that they look good on a CD cover.

That's why I reckon Hattogate has been one of the biggest revelations to hit the classical music scene. B-C unwittingly exposed the elitism, snobbery and hype that surrounds this business and I thank him for that. The one question that remains is: If the pianists who actually recorded the Hatto CDs were so good, why has the classical music media not lauded them already? The answer is obvious (they're all pompous wankers who actually know SFA) and it's why I enjoy and value the input of all the posters on this forum. Keep it up guys, any one of you is a eminently preferable to a Tom Deacon!

[M forever]

The one things that does come out of this is Barrington-Coupe's ability to pick out some excellent piano playing from virtually unknown pianists

Like Ashkenazy or Bronfman?

[Shrunk]

One of the most sensible things I have read on the Hatto scandal is a letter by Robert von Bahr, CEO of BIS Records, in the June 2007 issue of Gramophone.  In it, he defends his decision not to sue Barrington-Coupe for copyright infringement.  It will restore your faith in the wisdom of the people running the recording industry.

[Mark]

One of the most sensible things I have read on the Hatto scandal is a letter by Robert von Bahr, CEO of BIS Records, in the June 2007 issue of Gramophone.  In it, he defends his decision not to sue Barrington-Coupe for copyright infringement.  It will restore your faith in the wisdom of the people running the recording industry.

Agreed ... yet he got slammed by someone. Harriet Smith, was it? I've always found her a tad bitter and opinionated at times.

[not edward]

Robert von Bahr is a class act. He's one of a very few people who came out of l'affaire Hatto looking good.

[Shrunk]

Agreed ... yet he got slammed by someone. Harriet Smith, was it? I've always found her a tad bitter and opinionated at times.

I don't have the issue handy, but I believe his letter was a response to a Harriet Smith column that took the recording industry as a whole (not just BIS) to task for not standing up for their artists and suing for damages.  I think she raised valid questions, but I wouldn't be surprised if the companies actually considered suing and were dissuaded once they talked with their lawyers.

[Holden]

Like Ashkenazy or Bronfman?

They were exceptions, the majority of the pianists he chose recorded for minor labels.

[BorisG]

Robert von Bahr is a class act. He's one of a very few people who came out of l'affaire Hatto looking good.

Class act?  A well-meaning gent, no doubt, and I suppose his fans liked the "look at Bis" goodwill gesture, but it wasn't necessary. It was plain to see early on that nothing was to be gained from lawsuits. Once the crook came clean, the industry was satisfied.

Apart from the two or more crooks, I thought most braved the element well enough. Some critics and buyers were slightly more embarrassed, but that does not make them bad people.

[Mark]

Some critics ... were slightly more embarrassed ...

Bryce Morrison, perhaps?

[Shrunk]

I'm not sure why any of the critics who lauded the "Hatto" recordings would have reason to be embarassed.  If anything, it shows that their opinions were not influenced by how well-known the artist was, or how prominent the record label.

[Don]

I'm not sure why any of the critics who lauded the "Hatto" recordings would have reason to be embarassed. 

Well, those critics were fooled.  And don't forget that the recordings of the real artists were not uniformly praised when newly released.  I do feel there was a "jump on the bandwagon" element to this whole mess.  The glowing reviews given to the so-called Hatto recordings just didn't make sense in that every disc was declared exceptional as if Hatto was the greatest pianist ever born.

[Lilas Pastia]

What is totally incomprehensible is how critics or the music world in general could seriously think that anyone recording such a huge range of repertoire could actually excel in everything. It's never happened before. Shouldn't that be a giveaway?

Classical music is a very compartmented field. All great soloists have been recognized as masters of only a select number of composers or genres. The omnivorous types (Ashkenazy, Jandö) may have the technical ability, but not the musical intelligence or sensitivity to encompass successfully stuff as diverse as 'Hatto' purportedly did.

Come to think of it, when you zero in on a particular interpreter, like Richter, Pogorelich, Horowitz, Kempff, Arrau, are we not looking for precisely that very quality of selectiveness and individuality ?

[Don]

What is totally incomprehensible is how critics or the music world in general could seriously think that anyone recording such a huge range of repertoire could actually excel in everything. It's never happened before. Shouldn't that be a giveaway?

It should have been, and it's the reason that many reviewers deserve the embarrassment they felt.

[BachQ]

What is totally incomprehensible is how critics or the music world in general could seriously think that anyone recording such a huge range of repertoire could actually excel in everything.

Or that this cancer-stricken septuagenarian was able to assemble a world-class symphony orchestra to accompany her for numerous recordings of piano concerti by Brahms, Rachmaninov, Tchaikovsky etc. ...... all under the baton of a mystery conductor leading a mystery orchestra ........

Even a modicum of due diligence would have revealed the fraud early on .........

[Lilas Pastia]

When those laudatory reviews started pouring one after another, I almost immediately lost interest (in the sense that I just didn't believe them). It never occurred to me that the object of the reviews was a ghost. I just figured that the critics were crassly serving some commercial interests.