The Bluffers Guide
Gilbert and Sullivan? Errr... Who?
The simplest way to describe these two is as the Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice of the
late 1800s. They wrote a series of Comic Operas which were satirical parodies of life in
those days. Most of these works were extremely popular with both their audiences and the
theatre critics of the day. Around this time London had hundreds of theatres, who all had
people writing for them. Only a tiny fraction of this work has survived, and the works of
Gilbert and Sullivan are part of this fraction.
Who was this Gilbert bloke?
William Schwenck Gilbert was born in London in 1836. He lead an eventful early life, being
kidnapped and held for ransom at the age of two, contracting typhoid in his teens and
working as a barrister and a civil servant before turning to writing. He started writing
short pieces of poerty and prose for publication in magazines such as 'Fun'. (It was an
early rival to 'Punch') He illustrated his work with cartoons, and the colums were so
popular that anthologies of his work were published. He wrote under the pen name of 'Bab'
and his works became known as 'The Bab Ballads'. He also wrote a number of plays and the
libretti for some operas before his partnership with Sullivan began.
And Sullivan?
Arthur Sullivan was born into a musical family in 1842. He showed great musical tallents
from a very young age, and he could play a number of instruments by the time he was eight.
He spent time singing in the choir of the Chapel Royal, at St James' Palace, before at the
age of 15 he won the prestigeous Mendelssohn scholarship. This enabled him to attend the
Royal Academy of Music. His talents were so great that he was to win a further three years
of the scholarship, two of which were spent studying at the conservatoir which Mendelssohn
himself had founded in Leipzig. This training at some of the finest musical establishments
in the world made him an extremely well qualified composer. He published music in numerous
styles, writing for opera, choirs and orchestras and was also worked as a choir master.
How did they come to work together?
In 1871 a theatre owner called John Hollingshead approached Gilbert to write a show for his
Christmas season, and he asked Sullivan to write the music for the piece. The opera, called
'Thespis' was the first piece that the two worked on together, though the had met
previously. Despite praise from the critics the piece had a number of problems, mainly due
to the cast being poor singers. It ran for 64 performances, before closing, and Gilbert and
Sullivan went their seperate ways.
They were brought together again in 1875 by Richard D'Oyly Carte. He was a theatrical
agent, who also had considerable musical talent. He had seen a performance of Thespis
during its original run, and he had realised that the work was the hearald of a great
future for the pair. He engaged them to write a piece for a show he was producing. He was
able to get them to work together again because he was friendly with both Gilbert and
Sullivan. The work, entitled "Trial by Jury" was first performed in 1875, and it ran for
300 performances in total, and was an unequivical success.
What is Opera anyway?
The Concise Oxford Dictionary describes opera as "a dramatic work in one or more acts, set
to music for singers (usually in costume) and instrumentalists" Classical opera is usually
sung in foreign languages, such as Italian, and is mostly based on serious stories of Gods
or Love. The works of the likes of Gilbert and Sullivan are performed in English, and are
often refered to as "Operetta", since they are a lighter form of entertainment, containing
humour and spoken dialog between the songs. Because of it's Italian roots, the plot and
words for an opera are known as the Libretto.
What did they write?
The complete list of ther joint works is as follows:
Thespis, Trial by Jury, The Sorceror, HMS Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance, Patience,
Iolanthe, Princess Ida, The Mikado, Ruddigore, The Yeomen of the Guard, The Gondoliers,
Utopia Limited and The Grand Duke. Plot summaries, musical extracts and other information
about these shows are available from The Gilbert and Sullivan Archive website. More general
information and links can be found at the Yahoo GandS page. During their working
relationship both men continued to work on other projects, and their complete lists of
works are quite substantial.
Why did they stop writing?
By the time that they were writing 'The Grand Duke' Gilbert, Sullivan and D'Oyly Carte were
ill. Gilbert had become weary of writing the plots for the shows, and musical tastes were
changing. The critics were not pleased with the show, criticising its libretto and it's run
did not last long. Sullivan died near the end of 1900, and D'Oyly Carte followed him the
year after. Gilbert survived until 1911.
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