Review (PDF) The Complete Plays Of Gilbert And Sullivan
From Trial by Jury to The Pirates of Penzance: the complete librettos of all fourteen Gilbert and Sullivan operas. Gilbert's verses for Sullivan's music are the most fastidiously turned and inventively rhymed in all lyric comedy. As the Savoy Operas enter their second century on a swell of renewed popularity, Gilbert's reputation as the supreme wordsmith of light opera remains secure. Complete and authentic, these are the librettos on which modern performances and recordings are based. Scattered among the songs are over seventy of the amusing, quirky pictures Gilbert drew to illustrate them. A chronology prepared for this edition sketches the authors' lives and careers. This is a book that no lover of Gilbert and Sullivan, musical comedy, or indeed the English theater will want to be without.
Paperback: 624 pages
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company (September 17, 1997)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0393316882
ISBN-13: 978-0393316889
Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 1.2 x 8.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
Best Sellers Rank: #366,471 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #10 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Sheet Music & Scores > Composers > Gilbert #11 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Sheet Music & Scores > Composers > Sullivan #57 in Books > Humor & Entertainment > Sheet Music & Scores > Historical Period > Modern Popular
I invested in this book intending to listen to and memorize all fourteen of the Savoy operas...I now know ten of them practically from heart, which scares my friends terribly. The funny thing is that, although I intended to buy it solely so that I could sing the words to Sullivan's wonderful hummable tunes, I found myself reading the plays just for the pleasure of Gilbert's clever rymes and horribly improbable plotlines. His "Bab" illustrations are also included beside the text, which opens up another side of Gilbert's genius. But be forewarned: There are several mistakes in the text - mostly words such as "is" being replaced with "it," but also some words that are different. Perhaps the words have changed over time from the origonal texts, but once in a while you'll find a word sung differently than what's written. I treat the book like I'd treat an edition of Shakespeare - dramatic work is always bent and changed slightly. In spite of the minor textual mistakes, it is a very useful book and it's nice to have the libretto laid out without any commentary or annotations.
Back in prehistoric times when records were brittle things and only came in one speed, 78 RPM's, one of my mother's favorite albums was "H.M.S. Pinafore." She played it frequently. Too young to understand the satire, I was attracted by the catchy music. I loved to hear the captain sing "I am the Captain of the Pinafore," immediately followed by the response of the chorus. This plus "Poor Little Buttercup" and "The Ruler of the Queen's Navee" made a fan of me for life.Several years later, and after having attended performances of several of these comic operas, I began to read Gilbert's lyrics. I must confess that I got much greater enjoyment out of reading lyrics that were from Gilbert and Sullivan performances that I had attended. I think that must be because neither the words nor the music are nearly as enjoyable in the absence of the other.I have read that Gilbert and Sullivan had a very stormy relationship. I'm glad that they managed to work together as often as they did because they really complemented one another. What they accomplished as a team speaks for itself in the continued performance of so many of their works over a hundred years after they were first performed.I have an older hardback of THE COMPLETE PLAYS and I found some humor in the following which may have been corrected in later copies. The book starts off with Chronological Biographies of each man. In Gilbert's it states< "first meeting with Arthur Sullivan autumn of 1870." In Sullivan's we find the following. "Met W. S. Gilbert 1871." Something metaphysical afoot perhaps.In summary, in my opinion, the works in this book, while certainly enjoyable reading, were really meant to be performed in order to give maximum enjoyment. Others may very well disagree with this opinion and I see nothing wrong with that.
The complete lyrics and dialogue for 14 Gilbert and Sullivan Operettas.Written during the last half of the nineteenth century, these operettas are funny, entertaining and can easily be adapted to make fun of any current political event (and quite often are). Too grand to be called Musical Theatre and too English to be called Opera, these operettas include such favourites as The Mikado, The Pirates of Penzance, Iolanthe, H.M.S. Pinafore and all the rest.This is the perfect book for Gilbert and Sullivan fans, professional and amateur theatre troops alike.In the Kindle version of this book, the text appears complete, with no errors or omissions. The interactive contents list makes finding the correct play easy, but there is no way to navigate between acts using the 5way controller. There are no pictures in the Kindle version, however, I do not know if there were any in the original.There is limited citation as to which book this was transcribed from. 's title for this work (at time of writing this review) is 'The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan' however, the book claims to be 'The 14 Gilbert and Sullivan Plays'. A small discrepancy, I know, but I just thought I'd point it out just in case it proves useful to someone.
Its wonderful to have this available on my Kindle when I want to figure out exactly which words are being sung or to read the dialogue between songs.My one complaint would be that the table of contents links to each act, rather than each song, making it difficult to find one particular song. Patter songs, for example, are far more likely to require looking up than most other songs in the work.Other than that, though, its quite nice to have.
I'm a huge Gilbert & Sullivan fan, and thought it would be cool to have the texts of my favorites handy in my Kindle-Fire. But whoever edited this book made so many typos and misquotes that it was ruined for my purposes. So I deleted it, I'm sorry to say.
It is wonderful to be able to get the complete plays of Gilbert and Sullivan with one click. (Well, actually just Gilbert, since there is no music in this volume, just text.) Unfortunately, the text will only display "centered" on my Kindle, which makes reading a bit difficult. Still, it's a great addition to a reference e-library.
The Savoy Operas: The Complete Gilbert and Sullivan: The Complete Gilbert and Sullivan (Penguin Classics) The Complete Plays of Gilbert and Sullivan The Complete Gilbert & Sullivan: Librettos from All Fourteen Operettas (Complete & Unabridged) The Complete Annotated Gilbert & Sullivan: 20th Anniversary Edition Gilbert and Sullivan: Gender, Genre, Parody (Gender and Culture Series) Audition Songs for Male and Female Singers: Gilbert and Sullivan (Book & CD) (Audition songs for male & female singers) The Pirates of Penzance Vocal Score (Dover Vocal Scores) by Gilbert, W. S., Sullivan, Sir Arthur, Opera and Choral Score published by Dover Publications (2001) A Most Ingenious Paradox: The Art of Gilbert and Sullivan The Japan of Pure Invention: Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Mikado Oh Joy! Oh Rapture!: The Enduring Phenomenon of Gilbert and Sullivan The Cambridge Companion to Gilbert and Sullivan (Cambridge Companions to Music) Gilbert & Sullivan for Singers: The Vocal Library Baritone/Bass Bk with online audio GILBERT & SULLIVAN FOR SINGERS MEZZO-SOPRANO BK/CD THE VOCAL LIBRARY Gilbert & Sullivan: 15 Classic Songs for Keyboard (The Easy Keyboard Library) The Songs of Gilbert & Sullivan for Ukulele The Authentic Gilbert & Sullivan Songbook (Dover Vocal Scores) Gilbert & Sullivan (World's Greatest Classical Music) Gilbert & Sullivan for Singers Tenor Bk/online audio - The Vocal Library Gilbert American Flyer S Gauge Operating & Repair Guide: Volume 2 (Gilbert American Flyer S Gauge Operating and Repair Guide) Gilbert Law Summary on Property (Gilbert Law Summaries)
