No 13 — July 1979 Edited by Michael Walters
THE MIKADO, Sat. 2 December 1978. Albert Hall & BBC.
CAST: MK. Harry Coghill. NP. Philip Potter. KK. Peter Pratt. PB. Richard Howarth. PT. David Bowman. YY. Patricia Cope. PS. Joanne Moore. Pe. Elizabeth Gardner. Ks. Lyndsie Holland. Cond. Peter Murray. I missed this owing to another engagement in Cheam that night, but I had hoped it would be recorded by an enthusiast. And I was right. Through the kindness of a friend who lent me his cassette I was able to listen to it. The main interest of it was to hear Peter Pratt's speaking voice in G&S and to realise (with surprise) just how much John Reed appears to have copied his inflexions and ways of delivery on a number of lines. Although the actual voices are of course vastly different, the performances were remarkably similar. It was noticeable that only the ex?D'Oyly Carte singers knew their lines, the others made lots of textual errors. It was splendid, too, to be able to luxuriate in the warm honey of Philip Potter's voice. He was in superb voice singing with power and clarity. It must have been an interesting experience for Potter and Pratt to do the suicide scene in Act 1, for though they had both played it many times before, never with each other. Richard Howarth was a dreary and inept Pooh Bah who seemed incapable of saying a single line intelligently. Lyndsie Holland was a raucous Katisha, who shrieked more often than she sang. Her once beautiful voice seems to be over the top now. David Bowman gave an interesting and intelligent reading of Pish Tush, his singing voice was curiously clipped and dry. Joanne Moore sang "Sit with downcast eye" with pretty and clear tone, good diction and lucid and musical line. Patricia Cope's dialogue was good, and "The Sun whose rays" was sung with poise and intelligent phrasing. KoKo used Knightsbridge for Nanki?Poo's address, which seemed a bit unimaginative, and also said "I can't kill you, I'm very sorry, I can't kill anything..," Can anybody tell me when that extra phrase was added? "From every kind of man" was taken very fast, far too fast for Lyndsie Holland to sing, she just gabbled and stabbed at her notes. Harry Coghill was an interesting Mikado. The song was v good. The "laugh" was natural sounding and not over exaggerated as in the Adams or Ayldon way, and struck me as about the most effective laugh I have ever heard. His dialogue was delivered in a humorously off?hand way ? the sort of nonchalance of a John Hargreaves, and the style which I believe is probably closer to Richard Temple's original style than is the current D'Oyly Carte style. But in spite of the nonchalance, Coghill still managed to get a certain amount of evil glee on lines like "Describe it" ? but it was always light, never heavy. MICHAEL WALTERS
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