The Gilbert and Sullivan Light Opera Company of Long Island is a non-profit performing group that has produced mostly the works of Gilbert and Sullivan since 1954. The company is based in Long Island, New York. [1] A spin-off of the group is the Gilbert & Sullivan Yiddish Light Opera Company, which performs Yiddish translations of several of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas. [2] [3]
The Gilbert and Sullivan Light Opera Company of Long Island was founded in 1954. [4] The founders included Sally Buckstone and Norman Buddy Packer. [1] It started as an adult education course on Gilbert and Sullivan at Merrick High School in 1953, and its first production was The Mikado in 1954. Early on the group was named Gilbert & Sullivan Workshop of Long Island. [1] Since then it has performed all of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas and various related works around Long Island and beyond, [4] and in 1980 it adopted its current name. [1] [5]
The Yiddish division of the Company, Gilbert & Sullivan Yiddish Light Opera Company, launched in 1984. Initially a novelty fund-raiser, Der Shirtz (a 30-minute Yiddish version of H.M.S. Pinafore ), this company split off into its own organization. Under the leadership of longtime Company stalwarts Al Grand, Bob Tartell and Elaine Lerner, and directed by Sally Buckstone, what eventually became the Gilbert & Sullivan Yiddish Light Opera Company of Long Island developed Der Yiddisher Pinafore, Di Yam Gazlonim ( The Pirates of Penzance ) and Der Yiddisher Mikado, Yiddish versions of the most popular Savoy operas. The group's productions melded Victorian satire with Jewish humor. Jewish experiences and idioms were woven into the original plots, replacing Britishisms with Yiddishisms. All three adaptations played to sold-out audiences all over the United States, Canada and in London, England. [6] [2]
Gilbert and Sullivan refers to the Victorian-era theatrical partnership of the dramatist W. S. Gilbert (1836–1911) and the composer Arthur Sullivan (1842–1900) and to the works they jointly created. The two men collaborated on fourteen comic operas between 1871 and 1896, of which H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance and The Mikado are among the best known.
The Pirates of Penzance; or, The Slave of Duty is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert. Its official premiere was at the Fifth Avenue Theatre in New York City on 31 December 1879, where it was well received by both audiences and critics. Its London debut was on 3 April 1880, at the Opera Comique, where it ran for 363 performances.
The Mikado; or, The Town of Titipu is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and libretto by W. S. Gilbert, their ninth of fourteen operatic collaborations. It opened on 14 March 1885, in London, where it ran at the Savoy Theatre for 672 performances, the second-longest run for any work of musical theatre and one of the longest runs of any theatre piece up to that time. By the end of 1885, it was estimated that, in Europe and America, at least 150 companies were producing the opera.
H.M.S. Pinafore; or, The Lass That Loved a Sailor is a comic opera in two acts, with music by Arthur Sullivan and a libretto by W. S. Gilbert. It opened at the Opera Comique in London on 25 May 1878, and ran for 571 performances, which was the second-longest run of any musical theatre piece up to that time. H.M.S. Pinafore was Gilbert and Sullivan's fourth operatic collaboration and their first international sensation.
Alfred Cellier was an English composer, orchestrator and conductor.
The D'Oyly Carte Opera Company is a professional British light opera company that, from the 1870s until 1982, staged Gilbert and Sullivan's Savoy operas nearly year-round in the UK and sometimes toured in Europe, North America and elsewhere. The company was revived for short seasons and tours from 1988 to 2003, and since 2013 it has co-produced four of the operas with Scottish Opera.
Music Theater Works is a resident professional not-for-profit musical theatre company in Evanston, Illinois. It was founded in 1980 by Philip Kraus, Bridget McDonough, and Ellen Dubinsky.
Light Opera of Manhattan, known as LOOM, was an off-Broadway repertory theatre company that produced light operas, including the works of Gilbert and Sullivan and European and American operettas, 52 weeks per year, in New York City between 1968 and 1989.
Charles Donald Adams was an English opera singer and actor, best known for his performances in bass-baritone roles of the Savoy operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and his own company, Gilbert and Sullivan for All.
Patricia Leonard was an English opera singer, best known for her performances in mezzo-soprano and contralto roles of the Savoy Operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company.
New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players is a professional repertory theatre company, based in New York City that has specialized in the comic operas of Gilbert and Sullivan for over 40 years. It performs an annual season in New York City and tours extensively in North America.
For nearly 150 years, Gilbert and Sullivan have pervasively influenced popular culture in the English-speaking world. Lines and quotations from the Gilbert and Sullivan operas have become part of the English language, such as "short, sharp shock", "What never? Well, hardly ever!", "let the punishment fit the crime", and "A policeman's lot is not a happy one".
Lamplighters Music Theatre is a semi-professional musical theatre company based in San Francisco, California. Founded in 1952 by Orva Hoskinson and Ann Pool MacNab, the Lamplighters specialize in light opera, particularly the works of Gilbert and Sullivan, as well as such works as The Merry Widow, Die Fledermaus, Of Thee I Sing, My Fair Lady, Candide, and A Little Night Music.
The Gala Ensemble were a British group of five opera singers formed by SonyBMG in 2008 that recorded an album of selections from the works of Gilbert & Sullivan, such as The Pirates of Penzance, H.M.S. Pinafore and The Mikado.
Derby Gilbert & Sullivan Company, based in Derby, England, produced the works of Gilbert and Sullivan from 1966 to 2018. The company won the amateur competition at the International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival an unprecedented six times and was called "one of the most highly acclaimed nonprofessional theatre companies in the UK". The company also won awards from the Waterford International Festival of Light Opera.
Lakeshore Light Opera (LLO) is an amateur community theatre group that performs Gilbert and Sullivan operas in Pointe-Claire, Quebec, Canada. The company produced its first show in 1955. Early in its history, the group was directed by former D'Oyly Carte Opera Company member Doris Hemingway, and briefly conducted by her husband, former D'Oyly Carte conductor Harry Norris. The group was known as St Paul's Operatic Society until 1980, when it changed its name to Lakeshore Light Opera. For over 35 years, proceeds from its annual production have been contributed to the Lakeshore General Hospital.
Thomas F. Lawlor was an Irish opera singer. In the 1960s, he became known for his performances in mostly baritone roles of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company. In the 1970s and 1980s, he performed over 60 operatic roles, usually as a bass-baritone, with various British opera companies. He was also a director in the opera department of the Royal Academy of Music and at Trinity College of Music. In later years, he moved to the US, where he continued to perform, direct and teach.
The Toronto Light Opera Association was an opera company based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada that specialized in performing the works of Gilbert and Sullivan. It was founded in 1940 and disbanded in 1955.
Christene M. Palmer is a retired Australian singer and actress, known for her performances in the contralto roles of Gilbert and Sullivan's Savoy operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company during the 1960s. Her performance as Katisha in The Mikado is preserved in the D'Oyly Carte 1967 film version of that opera.
Memphis Bound is a 1945 American musical based on the Gilbert and Sullivan opera H.M.S. Pinafore. The score was adapted and augmented by Don Walker and Clay Warnick, with a libretto credited to Albert Barker and Sally Benson, "with gratitude to W. S. Gilbert and Sir Arthur Sullivan." The original production starred an all-black cast including Bill "Bojangles" Robinson, Avon Long, Billy Daniels, Ada Brown, and Sheila Guyse.
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