Ghost of Sunday Classics preview: Could we have a royal operetta without a dreamy prince?

GILBERT and SULLIVAN: Princess Ida: Act I, Introduction and Opening Chorus, "Search throughout the panorama for a sign of royal Gama"

Pavilion attached to KING HILDEBRAND's palace. Soldiers and courtiers discovered looking out through opera glasses, telescopes, etc., FLORIAN leading.

CHORUS: Search throughout the panorama
for a sign of royal Gama,
who today should cross the water
with his fascinating daughter --
Ida is her name.
Some misfortune evidently
has detained them -- consequently,
search throughout the panorama
for the daughter of King Gama,
Prince Hilarion's flame! Prince Hilarion's flame!
FLORIAN: Will Prince Hilarion's hopes be sadly blighted?
CHORUS: Who can tell? Who can tell?
FLORIAN: Will Ida break the vows that she has plighted?
CHORUS: Who can tell? Who can tell?
FLORIAN: Will she back out, and say she did not mean them?
CHORUS: Who can tell?
FLORIAN: If so, there'll be the deuce to pay between them!
CHORUS: No, no,
we'll not despair, we'll not despair!
For Ida would not dare
to make a deadly foe
of Hildebrand, and so --
search throughout the panorama
for a sign of royal Gama,
who today should cross the water
with his fascinating daughter --
Ida, Ida is her name.

[Opening Chorus at 3:41] George Baker (b), Florian; D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, Malcolm Sargent, cond. EMI, recorded Sept. 26 and 28, 1932 (digital transfer by F. Reeder)

[Opening Chorus at 4:12] Jeffrey Skitch (b), Florian; D'Oyly Carte Opera Chorus, New Symphony Orchestra of London, Isidore Godfrey, cond. Decca, recorded cOct.-Dec. 1954 (digital transfer by F. Reeder)

[Opening Chorus at 4:01] Jeffrey Skitch (b), Florian; D'Oyly Carte Opera Chorus, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Malcolm Sargent, cond. Decca, recorded May 1965

[Opening Chorus at 3:54] Bradley Wilson (b), Florian; Ohio Light Opera Chorus and Orchestra, J. Lynn Thompson, cond. Newport Classic, recorded live at the 1999 Ohio Light Opera Festival

by Ken

As I mentioned last week, I finally got wise to the existence of the "Gilbert and Sullivan Archive Edition" of the vocal score of Princess Ida (edited by Paul Howarth, first published in 2007, with a somewhat corrected edition published in 2013), and on arrival it has yielded an immediate discovery. You may recall that I had made the momentous decision to downgrade the "stub" of an overture to the opera from "overture" to "prelude." As it happens, I had never seen this piece in score, because the old Chappell edition, which until now was my only Princess Ida score, like the Chappell vocal scores of several other G-snd-S operas, didn't include the overture! These editions seem to have been frozen in time from the moment of original publication, when the publisher apparently hadn't yet received the overtures.

So what do I discover upon opening my new score? Two things:

(1) The orchestral introduction isn't called "Overture," it's called "Introduction"!

(2) The end of the Introduction is marked "attacca," meaning that it's meant to flow directly into the following number, the opera's opening chorus. I had had some reservations about the designation "prelude," since the piece is self-standing, but I harked back to the examples of the Preludes to Verdi's Rigoletto and Traviata. The attacca marking vindicates this, and I would go ahead comfortably calling the piece a "Prelude" if not for the possibility that the score designation "Introduction" actually traces back to Sullivan. So, "Introduction" it is -- and I thought our first order of business now should be to hear the opening of the opera this way. Like we just did above!

Beyond this, I thought that since we slipped into Princess Ida by focusing on the two kings, the fathers of our royal non-couple, this week we might focus on the young bridegrom, the son of King Hildebrand, Prince Hilarion -- and his friends Cyril and Florian (whom we just heard briefly in the vigil for the arrival of King Gama and his daughter).


SO LET'S MEET PRINCE HILARION

In both Gilbert's text and Sullivan's music, the young prince introduces himself as aptly as we could hope, as an unabashed princely romantic. There's just one small problem. As with a number of Sullivan's tenor ballads, if this one isn't sung really well it can sound saccharine, whiny, and barely endurable. This is one of the crucial areas in which I am floored by the widespread view of many (most?) G-and-S devotees that real singing not only doesn't matter but perhaps even spoils the "fun." (I hope you understand why I had to put "fun" in quotes.)

To further complicate matters in the case of Princess Ida, it has not one but two principal tenor roles, and most tenors would probably agree that the other one, the prince's macho friend Cyril, is actually the juicier role. The upshot is that Hilarion may wind up being cast with the second-best tenor available to a company.

All that said, I'm surprised to find myself rather enjoying the recording by Derek Oldham, held up by many G-and-S devotees as the prince of G-and-S tenors, who usually drives me kind of crazy with that silly syrupy slurping and vocal namby-pambiness. Yes, some of that is here, but there's also some real core to the voice, and some strength in the phrasing.

One interesting interpretive touch here: Obviously the fanfare-like introduction to the prince's recitative is meant to echo the fanfare that introduced the Opening Chorus; however, Isidore Godfrey in the 1954 D'Oyly Carte Ida bends it the other way, adapting the fanfare to the prince's dreamy romanticism.

Princess Ida: Act I, Recitative and Song, Prince Hilarion, "Today we meet, my baby bride and I" . . . "Ida was a twelve-month-old, twenty years ago"

Prince Hilarion: Recitative
Today we meet, my baby bride and I,
but ah, my hopes are balanced by my fears!
What transmutations have been conjured
by the silent alchemy of twenty years?
Song
Ida was a twelve-month-old, twenty years ago;
I was twice her age, I'm told, twenty years ago.
Husband twice as old as wife
argues ill for married life;
baleful prophecies were rife,
twenty years ago, twenty years ago!
Stlll I was a tiny prince, twenty years ago;
she has gained upon me since, twenty years ago.
Though she's twenty-one, it's true,
I am barely twenty-two!
False and foolish prophets you,
twenty years ago, twenty years ago!

Derek Oldham (t), Prince Hilarion; D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, Malcolm Sargent, cond. EMI, recorded Sept. 26, 1932 (digital transfer by F. Reeder)

Thomas Round (t), Prince Hilarion; D'Oyly Carte Opera Chorus, New Symphony Orchestra of London, Isidore Godfrey, cond. Decca, recorded cOct.-Dec. 1954 (digital transfer by F. Reeder)

Philip Potter (t), Prince Hilarion; D'Oyly Carte Opera Chorus, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Sir Malcolm Sargent, cond. Decca, recorded May 1965

John Bernard (t), Prince Hilarion; Ohio Light Opera Orchestra, J. Lynn Thompson, cond. Newport Classic, recorded live at the 1999 Ohio Light Opera Festival

DEREK OLDHAM'S EARLIER VERSION

Oldham had already recorded Hilarion in the D'Oyly Carte's acoustical Princess Ida, made between Oct. 10 and 15, 1924 (except for a single side redone the following February). I don't have a great source, but here is the 1924 "Today we meet." It's vocally smoother, but more characteristically Oldham-ish -- I actually like it less than the 1932 version. (Could the more purposeful 1932 conducting have anything to do with this?)


Derek Oldham (t), Prince Hilarion; Light Opera Orchestra, Harry Norris, cond. EMI, recorded Oct. 15, 1924

IN THIS WEEK'S GHOST OF SUNDAY CLASSICS POST

Prince Hilarion and His Friends

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