International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival

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Buxton Opera House, home of the festival

The International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival is held every summer at the Opera House in Buxton, Derbyshire, England. The three-week Festival of Gilbert and Sullivan performances and fringe events attracts thousands of visitors, including performers, supporters, and G&S enthusiasts from all around the world. It was established in 1994 by Ian Smith and his son Neil to enhance the knowledge, understanding and appreciation of the works of Gilbert and Sullivan. It also has a goal of reinstating G&S and the performing arts in schools in Britain. Since 2010, the Festival has added a week of performances in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

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[edit] Description of the Festival

Each summer, beginning with the last weekend in July (or start of August if August begins on a Saturday), the Festival includes over three weeks of nightly G&S operas and dozens of daytime fringe activities. The Festival has been held in Buxton, England, every year since 1994, but it has experimented with additional weeks of the Festival in other towns or cities, including Eastbourne, England once, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania twice, Berkeley, California once[1][2] and Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, beginning in 2010.[3] The festival attracts approximately 20,000 visitors and about 3,000 performers to Buxton each year.[4]

Sky Arts notes that the "Festival, which runs at Buxton’s beautiful Opera House, is one of the most colourful, melodic and joyous festivals of musical theatre you will come across. Celebrating the timeless, waspishly satirical lyrics of W. S. Gilbert and the brilliant musical inventiveness of Arthur Sullivan, the festival is quite simply the world’s biggest event dedicated to the Savoy operas. ... It is forward-looking and fun presenting contemporary as well as traditional productions of G&S."[5]

[edit] The competition

Lithograph from The Mikado

At the core of the Festival is a competition of a dozen or more amateur G&S performing troupes who travel to Buxton from all over the world to present their shows.[6] Over the three weeks, "the best non-professional groups from the UK and overseas compete for the International Champions title."[5] A professional adjudicator critiques each amateur performance immediately after the curtain falls. The adjudicator then scores each performance, and both group and individual awards are announced at the end of the Festival.[7][2] At the first Festival in 1994, first prize was awarded to the production of Utopia Limited presented by the Gilbert & Sullivan Society of Hancock County, Maine, USA. The Derby Gilbert & Sullivan Company has won the first prize more often than any other company (six times); and the South Anglia Savoy Players, the only company to have performed in every Festival since the first one, have won four times and placed second four times. Festival Productions, Ireland, won in 2007, 2008 and 2009. Individual awards are also presented for performers, directors and musical directors.[8]

Some groups compete year after year at the Festival, but some companies, especially those travelling from North America, South Africa, Australia and other distant places, may only visit occasionally or once. Some groups meet and rehearse entirely at the Festival, including the internet group SavoyNet, which has competed each year since 1998 and was the first company to present all 13 extant G&S operas at the Festival. The Festival organizers also rehearse a Festival Production (for which all rehearsals take place during the Festival itself) and one or more "Youth Productions" (for performers under 18) during the course of the Festival each year.[1][9][10]

[edit] Professional productions

In addition to the amateur productions that are presented and compete at the Festival each year, there are weekend professional performances given by companies such as the Carl Rosa Opera Company, Opera della Luna,[2] the New York Gilbert and Sullivan Players, Charles Court Opera and the Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Company, which has starred such well-known G&S performers as Richard Suart, Simon Butteriss, Bruce Graham, Gillian Knight, Barry Clark, Michael Rayner, Patricia Leonard, Donald Maxwell, Jill Pert, Janet Cowley, Gareth Jones, Charlotte Page, Oliver White, Rebecca Bottone, Ian Belsey, the Opera Babes and Eric Roberts. John Owen Edwards or David Russell Hulme often music direct the company.[1][7][11] Sky Arts calls these performers "some of the UK’s finest exponents of musical theatre".[5] Of the productions by the G&S Opera Company, which is produced by the festival organizers, and specifically their 2010 production of Iolanthe, reviewer Raymond J. Walker wrote:

"With a reputation for strong casts [and] energetic delivery, traditionally fresh interpretations are brought to roles familiar to a large proportion of the Buxton audiences. With good stars like Jill Pert and Richard Suart in key roles, we were assured of an excellent evening’s entertainment. ... Care is always taken with the staging and lighting of these Buxton productions and, as with Princess Ida last year, they can match a West End show. ... Throughout, the chorus was outstanding. ... the strength of singing from the twenty-strong chorus in forte passages was spectacular".[12][13]

In August and September 2010, the G&S Opera Company presented its first production outside of the Festival, at Oxford Castle.[14][15]

[edit] Venues and fringe events

All of the competition performances and the weekend professional performances are given in the Frank Matcham-designed Buxton Opera House (built in 1903), a 902-seat opera house with excellent acoustics.[16] These performances are nearly always accompanied by the festival's "National Festival Orchestra". A review of a 2010 performance noted, "The music was up to Buxton's usual high standard, with the orchestra (leader, Sally Robinson) ... giving a superb and sprightly reading of the Overture and score throughout."[12] The Festival also holds performances and fringe activities in the 360-seat Pavilion Arts Centre (formerly the Paxton Theatre),[16] the annexed Octagon auditorium and in other venues.[17]

The numerous daytime "fringe" activities have included performances, master classes and lectures by members of the original D'Oyly Carte Opera Company (such as Valerie Masterson, Thomas Round, Gillian Knight, Kenneth Sandford, John Ayldon and John Reed) and other professionals, and a late night Festival Club, where cabaret performances are given each evening after the opera, and sometimes a G&S singalong is conducted.[2] There is also a G&S memorabilia fair, providing a chance for collectors and gift hunters to buy and sell G&S recordings, DVDs, books, scores, figurines and other items of interest.[1] Fringe events also include recitals, concerts, lectures and productions of lesser-known works by Gilbert without Sullivan, Sullivan without Gilbert and works that played as companion pieces with the Gilbert and Sullivan operas during their original productions and later.[18]

[edit] Effect and allure of the Festival

The Festival serves as a "lightning-rod" of G&S activity worldwide. G&S performers and audiences from one part of the world can see performances by groups from other parts of the world. Performances in the traditional style mix with avant garde ones, and G&S scholars can communicate with a wide audience of enthusiasts.[19]

Buxton, an intimate, yet bustling spa town located in the Peak District about an hour southeast of Manchester, has proved to be an excellent setting for summer opera festivals, with good choices for lodging, dining and local sightseeing. There are nearby castles (for example, Peveril Castle), stately homes (e.g. Chatsworth House, Haddon Hall, Hardwick Hall and Calke Abbey); and numerous limestone caverns, including Poole's Cavern, right at the edge of Buxton. The small size of the town allows visitors and performers to meet and mingle freely during the course of the Festival. Jean Dufty, in Gilbert & Sullivan News wrote: "The amateur performances were of a very high standard.... There is a lovely atmosphere in Buxton of Gilbert and Sullivan thriving, being enjoyed, and drawing everyone together as a family."[20][21] The Festival has developed "a reputation for being one of the friendliest musical festivals anywhere, with people returning year after year to soak up its special atmosphere."[21]

In addition, the Festival serves to raise awareness and funds for the Festival organizers' efforts to re-introduce G&S into British schools.[9][10] The Festival has been featured in several British television shows and in the documentary films Oh Mad Delight[22] and A Source of Innocent Merriment.[23] Sky Arts broadcast its features about the Festival and Gilbert and Sullivan several times in 2010.[5]

[edit] Recordings

Recordings are available from the Festival organizers of most of the productions that have been seen at the Festival, including those by the professional Gilbert and Sullivan Opera Company.[24]

[edit] See also

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b c d Festival history pages
  2. ^ a b c d Sandham, David. "Buxton Festivals". Buxton Festivals website with links to photos and reviews of each Festival, accessed 19 September 2010
  3. ^ Fine, John Christopher. "Gilbert & Sullivan Fare Is Alive and Well". The Epoch Times, 13 July 2010
  4. ^ Moss, Stephen. "Gilbert and Sullivan: The unbearable lightness of being". The Guardian, 21 January 2010, accessed 6 August 2010
  5. ^ a b c d "Sky arts at the Gilbert and Sullivan Festival". Sky Arts, British Sky Broadcasting, accessed 13 August 2010
  6. ^ Hewett, Ivan. "The Magic of Gilbert and Sullivan". The Telegraph, 2 August 2009, accessed 14 April 2010
  7. ^ a b Lee, Bernard. "Gilbert and Sullivan are still going strong after a century", The Telegraph, 1 August 2008
  8. ^ Sandham, David. "Champions". Buxton Festivals website page showing the top three winners each year, accessed 19 September 2010
  9. ^ a b Elkin, Susan. "Let’s have more Gilbert & Sullivan in schools". The Stage, 2 August 2010
  10. ^ a b "G&S festival grows and expands across Atlantic". The Sheffield Telegraph, 22 July 2010
  11. ^ Cockroft, Robert. "Review: International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival", Yorkshire Post, 14 August 2009
  12. ^ a b Walker, Raymond J. "Buxton International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival 2010 - Iolanthe". Seen and Heard International, MusicWeb International, accessed 6 August 2010
  13. ^ See also, Gore-langton, Robert. "Yum-yum, a Mikado that's utterly delicious". Daily Mail, 20 August 2010
  14. ^ Lisle, Nicola. "Yeomen of the Guard: Oxford Castle". The Oxford Times", 19 August 2010
  15. ^ Christiansen, Rupert. "The Yeoman of the Guard, Oxford Castle, review". The Telegraph, 2 September 2010
  16. ^ a b Woolman, Natalie. "Buxton Opera House to open new Pavilion arts venue". The Stage, 7 September 2010
  17. ^ June 2007 Festival Newsletter, p. 5
  18. ^ See, e.g. "The Mountebanks gets a rare outing", Sheffield Telegraph, 5 August 2010; and "Moving pictures story that delighted the Victorians", Sheffield Telegraph, 12 August 2010
  19. ^ Bradley, chapter 10
  20. ^ Dufty, Jean. "Buxton Gilbert and Sullivan Festival, 1998" in Gilbert & Sullivan News vol. II, no. 13, p. 8 (Autumn, Winter 1998, The Gilbert and Sullivan Society)
  21. ^ a b Walker, Raymond J. "Buxton International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival 2010". MusicWeb International, accessed 6 August 2010
  22. ^ Article on the film Oh Mad Delight
  23. ^ Article on the film A Source of Innocent Merriment
  24. ^ Recordings available from the Festival

[edit] References

  • Bradley, Ian (2005). Oh Joy! Oh Rapture! The Enduring Phenomenon of Gilbert and Sullivan. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0195167007. 

[edit] External links

[edit] Festival information

[edit] Companies that have performed at the festival

Professional
Amateur UK award winners
Foreign amateur companies
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