110231-32 bk Iolanthe US 22/5/03 4:55 PM Page 8 Gilbert & Sullivan: Iolanthe, or the Peer and the Peri Great Operetta Recordings ADD CD 1 58:34 8.110231-32 1 Overture (Orchestra) 7:18 ACT 1: An Arcadian Landscape between 1700 and 1882 2 Chorus: Tripping hither, tripping thither (Chorus, Celia, Leila) 4:10 3 Invocation: Iolanthe! From thy dark exile (Queen, Celia, Leila, Iolanthe) 3:15 4 Song: Good morrow, good mother (Strephon, Chorus) 0:41 5 Ensemble: Fare thee well, attractive stranger (Queen, Fairies) 1:03 GILBERT AND 6 Song: Good morrow, good lover (Phyllis, Strephon) 0:42 7 Duet: None shall part us from each other (Phyllis, Strephon) 2:53 SULLIVAN 8 Chorus: Loudly let the trumpet bray! (Chorus) 5:43 9 Song: The Law is the true embodiment (Lord Chancellor & Chorus) 2:50 0 Recit: My well-loved lord (Phyllis); 4:05 Iolanthe Solo: Of all the young ladies I know (Lord Tolloller, Lord Mountararat, Phyllis, Chorus) ! Recit: Nay, tempt me not (Phyllis, Chorus); 5:09 Ballad: Spurn not the nobly born (Lord Tolloller, Phyllis, Lord Chancellor, Strephon, Ann Drummond-Grant Lord Tolloller, Chorus) @ Song: When I went to the bar (Lord Chancellor) 2:04 Martyn Green # Finale (Strephon, Phyllis, Lord Mountararat, Iolanthe, Lord Tolloller, Lord Chancellor, 18:41 Leonard Osborn Queen, Ensemble) Eric Thornton CD 2 29:36 ACT 2: Palace Yard, Westminster Fisher Morgan 1 Song: When all night long (Private Willis) 3:54 2 Chorus: Strephon’s a member of Parliament (Chorus of Fairies, Chorus of Peers) 1:28 Alan Styler 3 Song: When Britain really ruled the waves (Lord Mountararat, Chorus) 2:55 4 Duet: In vain to us you plead (Leila & Celia, Fairies) 1:56 Ella Halman 5 Song: Oh, foolish fay (Fairy Queen, Chorus) 2:59 6 Quartet: Though p’raps I may incur your blame (Lord Mountararat, Lord Tolloller, Phyllis, Private Willis) 1:52 The D’Oyly Carte Opera 7 Recit: Love, unrequited, robs me of my rest; Song: When you’re lying awake (Lord Chancellor) 3:37 Chorus and Orchestra 8 Trio: If you go in (Lord Mountararat, Lord Chancellor, Tolloller) 2:20 9 Duet: If we’re weak enough to tarry (Strephon, Phyllis) 1:28 Isidore Godfrey 0 Recit: My lord, a suppliant at your feet; Ballad: He loves! (Iolanthe) 2:14 ! It may not be (Lord Chancellor, Iolanthe, Queen, Chorus of Fairies) 2:48 (Recorded in London in 1951) @ Finale (Phyllis, Iolanthe, Queen, Lord Chancellor, Lord Mountararat, Lord Tolloller, Ensemble) 2:03 2 CDs 8.110231-32 8 110231-32 bk Iolanthe US 22/5/03 4:55 PM Page 2 William Schwenk Gilbert (1836-1911) and Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900) Iolanthe (or The Peer and the Peri) “…Nothing, I thought, could have been happier and Fogerty’s Fairy (1881), Gilbert transferred the than the manner in which the comic strain of House of Lords to fairyland. The result, a new kind of the piece was blended with its harmonies of féerie opera made more atmospheric by the new sight and sound, so good in taste from innovation of electric light. Iolanthe was the first G&S beginning to end.” work to be staged in D’Oyly Carte’s newly-built Savoy Theatre, on 25th November 1882, under the composer’s Also available: (Gladstone’s letter to Sullivan, December 1882) baton) where it ran for 398 performances. Opened on the same night on Broadway under the conductor Alfred Cellier, over the years it enjoyed various successful Although a noted amateur of literary genius, the resurrections and would remain a favourite with New political satire in Iolanthe may have eluded Queen York audiences (notably in 1926 with 355 Victoria’s Prime Minister. After already parodying performances) as well as in Australia and other British holders of high office - the navy (in Pinafore and colonies. At Sadler’s Wells, in 1962, it was the first Pirates), the Aesthetic Movement (in Patience) and Savoy work to be awarded a large-scale London jurisprudence (in Trial By Jury)- in Gilbert’s ingenious production and in 1987 was the opera chosen to launch new libretto Sullivan had found another sure vehicle for the revamped D’Oyly Carte Opera Co. One of the most caricature of the British peerage, not least Captain musically integrated and fluent of the Savoy opera Shaw, the Chief of the London Fire Brigade. scores, in its use and development of recurring musical Continuing the popular ‘fairy’ genre he had already themes Iolanthe is, as Arthur Jacobs observed “…the exploited in such pre-Sullivan farces and burlesques as work in which Sullivan’s operetta style takes a definite The Palace of Truth (1870), The Happy Land (1873) step forward”. 8.110176-77 8.110175 8.110231-32 2 7 8.110231-32 110231-32 bk Iolanthe US 22/5/03 4:55 PM Page 6 CD 2 Ward – but refused, again in his official capacity to Ann Drummond-Grant accept it. In a trio, their Lordships urge him to make Act 2 another application, which might prove successful 8 The wife of D’Oyly Carte conductor Isidore Godfrey and a stalwart in G&S contralto rôles, Ann Drummond Grant and all three dance out, arm in arm. Dispirited, Strephon (1904-1959) began her career as a soprano in opera, both amateur and professional, prior to joining the D’Oyly The scene is the Palace Yard, Westminster. On sentry enters and attempts to repair the rift with Phyllis. She Carte chorus in 1933. A member of the company for five years, during 1938 her rôles included Patience, The duty, Grenadier Guard Private Willis soliloquises on accepts that Iolanthe is his mother and the couple Plaintiff (in Trial By Jury), Josephine (in Pinafore), Aline (in The Sorcerer), Fiametta (in Gondoliers) and Elsie (in political polarity 1. The fairies, led by Celia, Leila and resolve to marry at once 9. Iolanthe enters and, giving Yeomen) and Celia and Phyllis in Iolanthe. Later, she branched into operetta (appearing notably in Waltzes From Fleta enter and sing jubilantly at Strephon’s election to them her blessing, reveals that Strephon’s father is none Vienna) and also sang in summer seasons but in 1950 she returned to D’Oyly Carte, where she assumed the leading Parliament, followed by the Peers, from Westminster other than the Lord Chancellor himself. Phyllis and contralto repertoire previously sung by Ella Halman. Hall, who are less than jubilant 2. Mountararat, Strephon take their leave and as the Lord Chancellor angered by Strephon’s introduction of a bill to subject enters, Iolanthe withdraws and shrouds her face in a the Peerage to greater scrutiny, pleads the case for the veil. In an aside to the audience, his Lordship announces Martyn Green House of Lords 3. Although impressed by the attire of that, as his further official application to himself has the Peers, and flattered by their attentions, Leila and been accepted, he is now engaged to Phyllis. Iolanthe Born William Martyn-Green in London, Martyn Green (1899-1975) studied singing first with his father, the Celia insist that their pomp will not influence Strephon comes forwards and pleads on behalf of Strephon 0, distinguished English tenor William Green, and later with Gustave García (1837-1925) at the Royal College of 4. The Peers depart and the Queen of the Fairies enters. but the Lord Chancellor insists that he is himself Music. After active service during the First World War, he gained his first stage experience in 1919, in musical She chides the fairies for admiring them, although she engaged to Phyllis until he discovers that Iolanthe is his comedy on Daly’s Theatre circuit. Green joined the D’Oyly Carte as a chorister and understudy in 1922 and his solo admits she is herself attracted by Private Willis (whom wife. The Queen of the Fairies enters, ordering début, as Luiz in Gondoliers, was followed by other comic leads including John Wellington Wells (in The she apostrophizes as ‘Captain Shaw’) 5. She departs Iolanthe’s death for breaking fairy laws, but the other Sorcerer), Major Murgatroyd (in Patience), the Major-General (in Pirates), The Associate (in Trial By Jury) and with her retinue and Phyllis enters, dejected despite the fairies protest that in that case they all must die, for they The Lord Chancellor in Iolanthe. His masterly portrayal of Ko-Ko The Lord High Executioner in The Mikado is fact that she is currently simultaneously “engaged” to too have married into the Peerage. At this the Lord preserved in the 1939 Technicolor screen adaptation by Geoffrey Toye and in the 1950 Decca studio recording the Lords Mountararat and Tolloller, who now arrive to Chancellor suggests, in a stroke of genius, that the law (Naxos 8.110176-77). After service in the RAF during the Second World War, he returned in 1946 to D’Oyly Carte assert their claims to her hand. To settle the matter a be changed to read: ‘Every fairy shall die who doesn’t to sing comic leads until 1951. Thereafter, he toured the United States, performing and directing as well as lecturing duel is suggested but is soon overruled by the ties of marry a mortal.’ To this the Queen consents and takes on the Savoy Operas. Martyn Green appeared on American TV (his was the voice of the fox in the cartoon friendship. Willis joins them in a quartet 6. As they the hand of Private Willis, who is instantly Pinocchio) and on Broadway as Chaucer in the Richard Hill-John Hawkins musical Canterbury Tales. He died in exit, the downhearted Lord Chancellor enters and sings transmogrified –into a fairy !.