Main Performers | Daisy Brown, Katie Slater, Nicholas Scott, Simon Butteriss, Leon Berger - vocals |
Orchestra or Band | English Festival Orchestra |
Set List | 'Overture' and 'For the Merriest Fellows We Are' from The Gondoliers', 'Over the Bright Blue Sea', 'Sir Joseph's Barge is Seen', 'The Hours Creep On Apace', 'Never Mind the Why and Wherefore', from HMS Pinafore, 'Entrance and March of the Peers', 'Nightmare Song', 'He Loves', 'With Strephon for Your Foe' from Iolanthe, 'Climbing Over Rocky Mountain', 'With Cat Like Thread', 'When the Foeman Bares His Steel' from The Pirates of Penzance INTERVAL 'Overture' from The Yeoman of the Guard, 'If You Want To Know Who We Are', 'Brightly Dawns Our Wedding Day', 'Behold the Lord High Executioner', 'As Some Day it May Happen', 'I Am So Proud', from The Mikado, 'Entrance of the Court and Drawing Room Music', 'Eagle High' from Utopia Ltd, 'List and Learn', We're Called Gondolieri', 'Take a Pair of Sparkling Eyes', Dance a Cahucha', Once More Gondolierei' from The Gondoliers |
Performance Notes | Something completely different! Join us at the Royal Albert Hall for an evening about as far removed - chorally speaking - from oratorio as you can get: the topsyturvy world of Gilbert & Sullivan. Gilberts wit seems not to age at all, and Sullivans music sparkles in response. We have programmed 14 of the bestknown choruses, and will intersperse these with solo and ensemble numbers from a team of accomplished young 20th-century Savoyards, crowned with the comic genius of Simon Butteriss (surely the leading comic baritone of his generation).
The thirteen Savoy Operas, named after the theatre where they were premiered in the last quarter of the nineteenth century, are the result of the collaborative genius of Sir William Schwenk Gilbert and Sir Arthur Seymour Sullivan. The partnership between these men produced a flow of delightfully witty comic operas, very lucrative both for them and for the impresario who commissioned the works, Richard DOyly Carte. Gilberts incredible storylines, involving mistaken identities, fairies, pirates, peers of the realm and improbable twists to bring the stories to their conclusion, struck a chord with the rather serious young composer, who responded with sparkling music which perfectly complemented the text. |
Related Archival Material | Programme (RAHE/1/2013/35) |