Gilbert and Sullivan
The Yeomen of the Guard, English National Opera review - half-good shot at an unusual G&S misallianceFriday, 04 November 2022![]() Sullivan’s Overture to The Yeomen of the Guard isn’t quite the equal of Wagner’s Prelude to Die Meistersinger – what is? – but its brass-rich brilliance and wholesome ceremonials wouldn’t have been possible without that great example. Cue... Read more... |
Patience, Charles Court Opera, Wilton's Music Hall review - bar room blissThursday, 25 August 2022“Twenty lovesick maidens we,” pining in stained-glass attitudes for florid poet Reginald Bunthorne, usually kick off Gilbert and Sullivan’s delicious mockery of the high (or cod) aesthetical. That might have been a problem for Charles Court Opera’s... Read more... |
Utopia, Limited, National Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company review - bounded raptureMonday, 08 August 2022![]() Joseph Heller grew tired of being told that he’d never written anything as good as Catch 22. ‘Who has?’, he'd retort. In the same spirit, it’s futile to compare Gilbert and Sullivan’s late flop Utopia, Limited to The Mikado, The Gondoliers,... Read more... |
The Gondoliers, Scottish Opera, Hackney Empire review - G&S con amoreSunday, 03 April 2022![]() Having sung the Gondoliers’ Duet with an Iranian tenor who’d been a big pop star in his native land, I know that internationalism hit performances of the Savoy operas some time ago (this superb but all-white ensemble admittedly doesn't follow the... Read more... |
HMS Pinafore, English National Opera review - shipshape classic comedy craftSaturday, 30 October 2021![]() Yes, it was bound to be HMS Laugh-a-minute, given Cal “One Man, Two Guvnors” McCrystal’s ENO comedy riffs on an already funny early G&S classic, but what does this tight little craft have to say to Little England today?That a British sailor’s “... Read more... |
The Gondoliers, National Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company review - charm where it mattersMonday, 29 July 2019![]() Once more, gondolieri! Gilbert and Sullivan's The Gondoliers leaps into life to the sound of a saltarello: a blaze of Mediterranean sunshine and good natured exuberance that sweeps you some 20 minutes into Act One on the same unbroken surge of... Read more... |
Iolanthe, English National Opera review - bright and beautiful G&S for allWednesday, 14 February 2018![]() Very well, so ENO's latest Gilbert and Sullivan spectacular was originally to have been The Gondoliers directed by Richard Jones and conducted by Mark Wigglesworth. But that Venetian fantasia has already been seen at the Coliseum in recent years,... Read more... |
Cavalleria Rusticana/Trial by Jury, Opera North review - sombre triumph and pale frothThursday, 28 September 2017![]() Pairing Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana with Gilbert and Sullivan’s Trial by Jury makes for a pleasingly schizoid evening in the latest of Opera North's The Little Greats series. Mascagni’s crashing final chords precede a longish interval, and when... Read more... |
‘A massive party full of treats and surprises’: Annabel Arden on six mini masterpieces at Opera NorthThursday, 14 September 2017![]() The first day of rehearsals for The Little Greats was thrilling and terrifying in equal measure: the casts of six shows, the whole chorus, all the creative teams and management milling around and talking nineteen to the dozen in the big, reverberant... Read more... |
Princess Ida, National Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company review - sparkling comedy, wobbly setsFriday, 01 September 2017![]() I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: you have to be pretty silly to take Gilbert and Sullivan seriously. But even sillier not to. And positively heroic to revive the pair’s 1884 three-acter Princess Ida: the show which – updated to a... Read more... |
The Mikado review - Sasha Regan's all-male operetta formula hits a reefThursday, 25 May 2017![]() Men playing boys playing girls, women and men, all female parts convincingly falsettoed and high musical standards as backbone: Sasha Regan's single-sex Gilbert and Sullivan has worked a special magic on Iolanthe and The Pirates of Penzance, HMS... Read more... |
Patience/Tosca, English Touring OperaWednesday, 12 April 2017![]() How well do you know your bad Victorian poetry? “When through the purple corridors the screaming scarlet Ibis flew/In terror, and a horrid dew dripped from the moaning Mandragores.” Go on, guess the author. Or how about this? “What time the poet... Read more... |
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