An 18th Century Operetta Composer? First Recording Of Charles Dibdin’s “The Wags”
Charles Dibdin is often thought of, assuming he is thought of at all, as one of the links between the
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Kurt Gänzl’s “Gilbert and Sullivan: The Players and the Plays”
I feel very honoured and flattered to have been asked to write about the most important book to be written
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Curtain Raisers: “Les Deux Aveugles” and “Cox and Box” At Wilton’s Music Hall
Opera della Luna, under the artistic direction of Jeff Clarke, has built a well-deserved reputation for staging inventive productions of
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Live In Buxton: The 27th International Gilbert & Sullivan Festival
The 27th International Gilbert & Sullivan Festival takes place at Buxton every year, before moving on to Harrogate. International even
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A Murderous Musical Mystery Tour: “Express G & S” In London
Express G&S was conceived during lockdown, and is the well nigh perfect post-lockdown entertainment, especially for Gilbert & Sullivan aficionados,
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Post-Lockdown: An Unusual Feast Of Operetta For The United Kingdom
The various ‘lockdowns’ that we, in the UK, have lived under for the last 18 months have meant that several productions
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The Showtime Series: Historic Recordings Of “Mademoiselle Modiste” & “Naughty Marietta”
After 1945, Decca and American Columbia developed the 33 rpm LP vinyl record to replace the 78 rpm shellac disc.
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Free Streaming: National G&S Company’s “Pirates of Penzance” From Buxton
Having had to cancel the 2020 festival owing to Covid restrictions, this year’s Gilbert and Sullivan Festival, taking place at
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Another “First” Recording Of Reynaldo Hahn’s 1933 “Ô Mon Bel Inconnu”
Venezuelan born Reynaldo Hahn (1874-1947) lived in Paris for most of his life, composed his first successful song (“If My
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“Die Fledermaus Zuhaus”: When 35 Artists From 7 Time Zones Come Together On YouTube
Die Fledermaus Zuhaus (The Bat At Home) is an abridged version of Johann Strauss’s Die Fledermaus developed during the various
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My Corona Year 2020: Discovering Wolfgang Anheisser’s “Operetten Gala”
My first theatre visit of 2020 was an ominous forewarning of what was to come: On 2 January I saw
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A Semi-Staged “Camelot” At The Watermill Theatre
In the United Kingdom restrictions on ‘live’ performance, owing to Covid-19, were lifted with regard to outdoor theatre at the
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Oscar Straus’ Piano Concerto & Other Rare Orchestra Pieces
My first ‘live’ encounter with Oscar Straus was attending a wonderfully inspired production of his first operetta Die lustigen Nibelungen
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“Cheer Up! British Musical Films 1929-1945” By Adrian Wright
In a preface to Cheer Up! British Musical Films 1929-1945, author Adrian Wright tells us that British Film Studios made
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Opéra-Comique Overtures By Lecocq, Offenbach & Co.
The record label Naxos has just released a fascinating CD containing French 19th century overtures. One of these is the
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“Trafalgar sur un volcan”: An(other) Operetta About Terrorists?
The German record label cpo has recently released a CD of two short operettas. One of them is a real
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“One Long Gender-Bender”: Berlin’s Queer Operetta Revolution In The Years 2010-2020
The Drama Review (TDR) is planning a special issue on the developments in the German theater scene from 2010 to
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Reading “The Cambridge Companion To Operetta” In Times Of Self-Isolation
The paperback edition of this fascinating, useful and, on the whole, well researched book sells for about 20 Euros on
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Sullivan, Cellier & Ford: “Haddon Hall,” “Captain Billy” And “Mr Jericho” On CD For The First Time
In 2018 the National Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Company staged the first professional revival of Haddon Hall for about one
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What The Nasty Old Lady Said. Or: “Zigeunerbaron” At Volksoper Vienna
I had really been looking forward to seeing the new production of Der Zigeunerbaron in Vienna because I had enjoyed
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Maury Yeston Meets Julian Slade. Or: “Amélie” At London’s The Other Palace
Amélie is a charming, whimsical, musical, based on a 2001 French Film, which was originally (2015) staged in California, and
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Francisco Barbieri’s “Barberillo de Lavapies”: The Classic BBC Recording In English
This is totally delightful! Francisco Barbieri (1823-94) was the leading exponent of the zarzuela revival of the mid-19th century. He
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“Mary Poppins” As London’s Unashamedly Old-Fashioned Christmas Spectacle
Mary Poppins is an unashamedly old-fashioned “feel-good musical,” at times very pantomimic in style, at times almost a “nostalgic operetta”
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Gilbert & Sullivan At Wilton’s Music Hall: An “HMS Pinafore” Performance To Remember
Wilton’s Music Hall is “the most important surviving early music hall to be seen anywhere” (says the Theatres Trust) and
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Offenbach Double-Treat in London: “La belle Hélène” and “Orpheus in the Underworld”
With the BBC Proms totally ignoring Offenbach’s bicentenary, it has been left to London’s music colleges, small scale opera companies
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“Das Feuerwerk” by Paul Burkhard & Erik Charell At Musikalische Komödie Leipzig
When I was about eight years old I have vivid memories of my mother doing the housework, continually singing “Oh,
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A New “Madame Pompadour” At Musikalische Komödie, Leipzig
The 1922 Madame Pompadour is not only one of Leo Fall’s last stage works (he died in 1925), it is
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The Devil In All Of Us: Suppé’s “Teufel auf Erden” (1878) In Chemnitz
With all the attention being given to Offenbach, it is easy to forget that 2019 is also the bicentenary of
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Offenbach’s “König Karotte” In Hannover: Farewell To The Production By Matthias Davids
German regional theatres excel in searching out rarely performed stage works and often breathing new life into them. Le Roi
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“La Princesse de Trebizonde”: Revisiting The Offenbach Production In Hildesheim
The World Heritage city of Hildesheim, 20 miles south-east of Hannover, possesses a charming, intimate, 600-seater theatre staging opera, musicals
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Howard Goodall’s “The Hired Man” At Queen’s Theatre: “A Serious Musical About Ordinary People”
In November 2018 I reviewed a concert performance of Howard Goodall’s Girlfriends, recommending his previous musical The Hired Man which
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Benatzky’s “Meine Schwester und ich” At Volksoper Wien
Benatzky’s 1930 hit Meine Schwester und ich in a new Wien Volksoper production is totally delightful and enchantingly charming. More
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A New “Man of La Mancha” at ENO and Volksoper
Not seen in London since its original production at the Piccadilly Theatre in 1968, when it starred Keith Michell as
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“Dorothy” By Alfred Cellier: World Premiere Recording
Before the building of railways into London from the rest of south-east England in the third quarter of the nineteenth
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Ábrahám’s “Märchen im Grand-Hotel” In Mainz
After having had great success in Berlin with three operettas on a very grand scale – Viktoria und ihr Husar
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Kálmán’s “Kaiserin Josephine” (1936) On CPO: Live From The Léhar Festival in Ischl
Kálmán composed Kaiserin Josephine after his ‘regular’ first night theater, the Theater an der Wien, had gone bankrupt as a
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