MORE QUAINT G & S REMARKS

CELIA: "For self-contained dignity, combined with airy condensation …”

ROSALIND CHESHER (on reading an obituary of Martyn Green in GG) "Who is Martyn Green?"

MIAOW TO YOU T00!

"It is however difficult to judge a score when played by an unpolished student orchestra; but the conductor, Paul Goodwin, caught the vivacious spirit of the work, adopting brisk, enjoyable tempos." Graeme Feggetter in Opera (May 1978) writing on Gretry's Richard Coeur de Lion at Nottingham University.

CONFERENCE IN EGHAM. Just after Easter this year, I attended the annual conference of the British Ornithologists Union held at the Royal Holloway College, Egham, Surrey. Baron de Worms was the only other G & S addict there. One of the highlights of this beautiful late Victorian building is a small but handsome collection of Victorian paintings, including a Turner, a Millais and a Landseer, hung in a very charming old gallery. Baron de Worms and I agreed that it would be a splendid place to stage Ruddigore. Afterwards on looking at The Savoyard I realised that a few weeks previous to my visit, the college had indeed staged Ruddigore in that very picture gallery. I am sorry to have missed it. The college was opened by Queen Victoria, whose imposing statue stood in the center of the quadrangle. Unfortunately the sparrows had been showing a typical lack of respect for the Great White Grandmother. M.W.

RADLEY FLYNN

Radley Flynn, former Savoyard, husband of Ella Halman, and once described as the eternal understudy, has died. Information from Palace Peeper. No further details.

H. M. S. PINAFORE - 100 YEARS OLD AND STILL SEAWORTY

At the last Club Night of the G & S Society's current season, tribute was paid to the Pinafore centenary. Ron Giffin gave a very interesting talk on the music of the opera, and we sang through Act 1 of the piece with Steve Bodle surpassing himself as Sir Joseph, Roger Nicholls as Corcoran, Roger Thompson as Deadeye, Barbara Nicholls as Buttercup, Cathy Fetherston as Hebe, Janet Crossman as Josephine, John Foster as Rackstraw and Ellis Pike making his debut with the G & S Society as the Bo'sun. Ron Giffin accompanied and Ian MacMillan, also making his society debut, conducted.

A SULLIVAN HOAX

On April 1st 1978, Classical Music Weekly published a spoof article about what was supposed to be a "lost" Gilbert & Sullivan opera, the libretto and most of the music of which had been found in an hotel in the south of France where Sullivan had stayed and left the opera behind. The article, by Richard Morrison, was well written. Even if one had not noticed the date on the outside of the cover, though, one ought to have been suspicious of the fact that the event had not made the headlines in The Guardian and other national newspapers. Furthermore, it is I think inconceivable that such a thing as a lost G & S opera could exist. For an idea to have got to the stage of completion of the libretto by Gilbert, and composition of most of the music by Sullivan the existence of it would have been mentioned somewhere in G & S's correspondence with each other and/or with D'Oyly Carte. The opera was called St. George and the Dragon which seems an unlikely title, too. Perhaps Mr. Morrison should be encouraged to write his own Gilbert and Sullivan opera, a la Anna Russell. MICHAEL WALTERS

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