Ruddigore

[Flosshilde]

Splendid perfromance of 'Ruddigore' tonight by Opera North tonight.


Why should the mention of Basingstoke induce calm & propriety in Mad Margaret?

[Roslynmuse]

Why should the mention of Basingstoke induce calm & propriety in Mad Margaret?

Not even Ian Bradley in his exhaustive commentaries on the operas can come with a plausible explanation for this; the best he can suggest is that it featured in a novel written by Gilbert's father and also that Gilbert would have passed through it when visiting his family in Salisbury. A word that teems with hidden meaning - maybe the humour is in the fact that it so clearly doesn't! (Not that I've ever been to Basingstoke.)

[Nick Armstrong]

Splendid perfromance of 'Ruddigore' tonight by Opera North tonight.


Why should the mention of Basingstoke induce calm & propriety in Mad Margaret?

My father directed this when I was a nipper, I remember sitting in on rehearsals, quite liked all the ghostly goings-on.

I'll ask him if he ever got to the bottom of the Basingstoke question, I remember it being discussed at the time. I always think of Ruddigore when I see it on a map or road sign. I think I once took my car for a specialist repair there...

[Chris Newman]

I have no idea of why Basingstoke causes such mirth unless the thought of the A30 was as boring as that of the M3 and A 303 nowadays. A train journey to London would have been as fast in those days. It would have been tiny in Gilbert's day, and probably quite picturesque. Today it is like Slough (of despond). It does contain one of the best concert halls in Southern Britain (the Anvil). I went to the other great concert hall yesterday: the Wiltshire Music Centre at Bradford on Avon.

[Bryn]

Tonight's Ruddigore is now up on the iPlayer on demand at 320kbps AAC-LC. Thank you Rupert Brun and the iPlayer team.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

The Wikipedia entry for Basingstoke includes the following:

Ordinary citizens were said to be shocked by the emotive, evangelical tactics of the Salvation Army when they arrived in the town in 1880, but the reaction from those employed by the breweries or within the Licence trade quickly grew more openly hostile. Violent clashes became a regular occurrence culminating on Sunday 27 March 1881 with troops being called upon to break up the conflict after the Mayor had read the Riot Act. The riot and its causes led to questions in Parliament and a period of notoriety for the town

G&S wrote Ruddigore in1886, perhaps still in the "period of notoriety"?

Or, as Chris suggests, perhaps it's just another of WSG's place names jokes (productions in the USA substitute "Baltimore", and in The Mikado KoKo refers to NankiPoo as having gone "abroad" "to Knightsbridge").

[DracoM]

Can someone please be patient with me and explain why G & S is so revered?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

I don't "revere" G&S, DracoM, I just love it! I associate it with amateur productions in which I (or close friends) have been involved. (I've also earned a decent bit of pocket money from playing in productions back in the day.)

At best they have some good tunes, decent contrapuntal tricks and some real rhyming howlers ("'Neath this blow/ Worse than stab of dagger/ 'Though we mo-/-mentarily stagger" "I once was a very abandoned person/ ... Nobody can conceive a worse'un"). At worst, Sullivan resorts to predictable "rum-ti-tum-ti" accompaniments (much of Act 2 of The Gondoliers is spoiled by this).

I'm never as impressed by professional productions: I saw this very Ruddigore at the Grand Theatre and it lacked the sparkle of the three amateur shows I've played in. You couldn't hear the words (spoken or sung) in the theatre, and Dick Dauntless missed a cue in his duet with Despard, but above all, everybody tried too hard to be funny. The orchestra was pretty good, though!

[LeMartinPecheur]

Do I recall another mention of Basingstoke somewhere else in G&S? As a former resident I collect literary references to this wonderful place, and therefore particularly enjoyed Ruddigore last night. I think the last time I heard it was as a teenager attending the annual G&S production by WAOS (Winchester Amateur Operatic Society) in the Guildhall, Winchester. But at that time I hadn't made the acquaintance of the fair town.

My favourite literary reference is in Chard Whitlow, Henry's Reed's parody of Eliot's Four Quartets:

"Oh, listeners,
And you especially who have turned off the wireless,
And sit in Stoke or Basingstoke listening appreciatively to
the silence,
(Which is also the silence of hell) pray, not for your skins,
but for your souls."
As a student of place names I love the irony that Basingstoke is merely the outlying farm of Basing, then a much more important place. Now Basing risks being swallowed by its own enormous offspring

[Norfolk Born]

[QUOTE=Flosshilde;93492]Splendid perfromance of 'Ruddigore' tonight by Opera North tonight.


Apparently the first new professional production for 20 years of the least-performed of the 'major' G&S oeuvre.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Apparently the first new professional production for 20 years of the least-performed of the 'major' G&S oeuvre.

Is this true?


And, if it is, does it matter, matter, matter, matter, matter, matter, matter, matter, matter ....

[Norfolk Born]

According to the Daily Telegraph.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Sorry, Norf; I wasn't really doubting what you said, just an excuse to put in a feeble joke that I forgot in an earlier post!

Best Wishes.

[Norfolk Born]

Your reply was (of course) particularly rapid but NOT unintelligible!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]