No 7 — July 1977 Edited by Michael Walters
[David Thomas, who lives in Melbourne, has been one of my most valued correspondents for some years now. He is an enthusiast on anything to do with the Victorian Era, and a mine of information. He writes as follows, dated 3 May 1977]
I was recently talking to my friend Frank (the one who is interested in early recordings), and having discovered in Leslie Baily's book that Nellie Bromley died as late as 1939, I asked him whether she ever recorded. Apparently she didn't - but while I was talking to him he revealed some interesting information on Wallace Brownlow, creator of the roles of Lieut. (Yeomen) and Luiz in Gondoliers ... it was news to me that Brownlow came to Australia, and in fact owned a pub in Kalgoorlie for a time. A very handsome man, he was pursued by ladies, but drink was his problem, and eventually finished him off ("doubled him up for ever"). He spent some time in America, returned here, and died, I think, in Melbourne. Anyway, Frank is sending me a copy of this information, and I'll keep a copy for you should you want it. I've found out nothing more about the old Savoyard Leicester Tunks, and I think the question of whether he and Eric Campbell in the early Charlie Chaplin movies were one and the same person is now a classic question of perennial interest, like the identity of Jack the Ripper - and about as hard to solve convincingly. While speaking of identification of people, I've no help to offer about the relationship between the New Zealand singer Kiri te Kanawa and Sullivan, though I imagine it’s through her mother's side of the family. ... The Australian Opera is doing Mikado and Gondoliers up in Sydney in October this year, with Dennis Olsen [a friend of David Thomas, was in the D'Oyly Carte chorus for a season several years ago] who is at present in Fra Diavolo. No further information as yet. These two operas are predictable box office draws - but what a pity we don't get anything more enterprising. I don't expect, of course, that they'd risk anything like say, a full-scale Sorcerer or Princess Ida - but why not Ruddigore or Yeomen?" I read with interest a letter in The G & S Journal concerning the pronunciation of "Heigh-ho!'' The writer brought in some useful analogies - but somehow overlooked the use of the very same word in "I have a Song to Sing-O," which I fancy couldn't be anything else but "Hay-dee". The writer could have clinched the argument for "hay" by reference to this, but apparently didn't think of it."
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