The D'Oyly Carte Opera: HMS Pinafore, 2CD

The production of “H.M.S. Pinafore” upon which this recording is based first saw the light of day in the D’Oyly Carte’s 1994-5 season. It was revived in the summer of 1999 at The Royal Festival Hall and again in February 2000 at London’s Savoy Theatre.

The nudging of the period setting more towards 1910 (as well as transforming this “H.M.S. Pinafore” into an earlier steamship) allowed much fun with the female chorus of Sir Joseph Porter’s “sisters and his cousins and his aunts” who became an eccentric gaggle of maiden-aunts, spinsters and protective birds of prey - and also included a pair of identical twins.

Listeners familiar with the opera will notice a few departures from the norm on this recording. The recitative before the Act 2 Finale is included, although the material is generally spoken in performance. Also the coda of the Act 2 Finale does not use the fanfare heard at the end of the overture and Act 1, but rather the extended version of what maybe be called Sir Joseph’s motif, the four chords that herald his entrance and form the basis of “I am the monarch of the sea”. We are very fortunate, too, in being able to include the discarded duet, newly-discovered, for Josephine and the Captain (“Reflect, My Child”).

We also reinstated the dialogue scenes for the character of Hebe. Mrs Howard Paul was to play the part in the original production - but it was soon apparent that, although she excelled as a performer, she could not cope with the musical requirements of the score. Therefore the inexperienced Miss Jessie Bond was hired to bear the vocal brunt of Hebe’s role. But when Mrs Paul discovered this, she was so offended that she stormed out of the theatre, never to return and, as a result, most of Hebe’s original dialogue was cut.

The fact that this production appears at The Savoy Theatre in February 2000 is particularly happy, as we are celebrating not only Sullivan’s centenary year, but also the first London production of a Gilbert & Sullivan opera in the 21st century.