Lovers of live performances are wonderful! They breast the wayward rain and brace the gales to appreciate their chosen art form and on Wednesday 29 December, the elements were fierce enough to put fear in the hearts of seafarers, never mind the landlubbers who had ventured forth to see Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance.
Premiered in New York on 31 December 1879, Pirates has remained one of G & S’s most popular comic operas. It tells the tale of Frederic who, having reached his 21st year, finds his indentures to the Pirate King (Alistair McGowan) have ended.
His short lived freedom from the fair-minded pirates is thwarted when he learns that because he has a leap year birthday, technically he is only about 5 so has to honour his contract and be a pirate for a further lifetime, (till the unimaginable 1940!).
Abandoning Ruth, (Beverley Klein) the ‘elderly’ maid who wants to marry him, Frederic has fallen in love with Mabel, the daughter of Major-General Stanley (Simon Butteriss), who agrees to wait for him. The Pirates come across the Major-General’s other three daughters and connive to marry them, to which said Major-General objects, avoiding capture with a heart breaking tale of his being an orphan which never fails to reach the soft centre of the Pirates.
With the help of the police, all is resolved amicably in the second act with all the loose ends being tied up in likely (or unlikely!) matrimony.
This terribly English institution of G & S comic operas that is at once utterly conservative and utterly absurd, is by its nature thoroughly anachronistic yet still enormously funny. With barely a nod to the 21st century (one RBS joke), this production was carried by the inherent gloriously comic rhymes and the satire of its time. Such is the love of the genre that the audience simply suspends disbelief, sits back and laps up the improbabilities of the plot in all its comic nonsense that is full of both sheer daftness coupled with poignancy and of course the fine performances of the cast.
The principal players were miked up, which may have been an issue for opera buffs in the audience who prefer to hear the singers’ natural ranges, but in fact, as well as saving the singers’ voices, the microphones showed their great clarity of diction of Gilbert’s fantastically funny story telling lyrics and puns. Even the very English pun of the words ‘orphan’ and ‘often’ was appreciated here in Scotland! (Mind you there is a posh shop in town using the slogan ‘50% orf’.)
The few props were used to full advantage, with a sheet magically becoming bride, bed and baby in a trice and a ship’s figurehead being convincingly and comically recreated by pirates and Ruth. The Major-General’s daughters were all beautifully dressed, with Edith, Isabel and Kate (Abigail Iveson, Anna Lowe, Rosie Bell) looking like the Puppinis on an afternoon picnic and proving capable of extremely impressive hopping in Act I as well of course as being in very fine voice.
The gentlemen of the Edinburgh Grand Opera Chorus were at first token pirates with bright scarves and bandanas, with half of them turning up like extras from the cast of Reservoir Dogs in Act II, dressed in black suits and shades. The ladies of the said chorus were lovely and colourful in their summer frocks and all looked as though they were thoroughly engaged in the goings on. They may be a pro-am company, but they look as though they put the emphasis on the former.
The well- known songs like A Policeman’s Lot is Not a Happy One, I Am a Pirate King, Hail, Poetry, The Modern Major General, With Cat-Like Tread, Poor Wandering One, Here’s a First Rate Opportunity and Climbing Over Rocky Mountain, are just a pleasure to hear, some having been famously parodied in other strands of popular culture. It’s music to make you hornpipe!
It is difficult to single anyone out in such a professional show, but Simon Butteriss as the Major General belies his convincing dodderiness by performing the astonishing verbal gymnastics required of the character. Beverley Klein played the comic older woman brilliantly and her leg dragging scene with Frederic was hilarious. The arrival of the Policemen is a treat, of course, and when they appear like Inspector Mclevy and with what looks like twin Audrey Hepburns crossed with Columbo, all performing very odd leg movements, the effect is very funny indeed. No wonder the sympathetic pirates and simply pathetic polis got such BIG appreciative applause.
This was a semi-staged concert performance of Pirates that lost nothing in its being so as the high professionalism of the singers the local chorus and orchestra. London and Manchester Concert Orchestras will play in the respective English concerts.
Tour continues:
Symphony Hall, Birmingham 01 January 7.30 pm
Barbican Centre, London 02 January 3.00 pm
The Bridgewater Hall, Manchester 08 January 3.00 pm
Ticket prices
£33.50, £29.50, £27.50, £24.50, £19.50, £14.50