As Cleethorpes has been getting a bit of an (entirely justified, imo) kicking on this thread, it might be instructive for us to remember the fish-gutter turned soul maestro who constitutes its sole (ha! Double pun!) positive contribution to the world:
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Raymond Edward O’Sullivan was, in my view, a very talented popular song writer. His lyrics were clever, his songs told a story and he sang in tune, and didn’t push his voice into areas they did not belong. As far as Gilbert and Sullivan are concerned Sullivan was a very good composer as his repertoire shows. Gilbert - nah - not keen at all!Originally posted by LMcD View PostComment
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Why?Originally posted by Conchis View PostI don't and never have - but, if I did, that's something I would keep very close to my chest indeed.
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In the early 90s, Q magazine described him as 'the world's most terminally un-hip pop star'. The label has stuck, but he still manages to play major venues when he tours. He must be doing something right!Originally posted by cloughie View PostComment
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Sullivan's music I can just about take (in very small doses) but Gilbert's awful, pompous, overbearing late Victorian lyrics (which were a baleful influence on Alan Jay Lerner and his like) I can do without. I suppose I owe them a small debt of gratitude, though, for making me feel more sanguine about not liking Verdi - because early to mid-period Verdi in English sounds exactly like G&S!Originally posted by cloughie View PostComment
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As I have already said I’m not keen on Gilbert, however I see no comparison with Lerner - My Fair Lady had some really good songs with very good lyrics.Originally posted by Conchis View PostComment
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Not keen on that one, but I was listening to Camelot on a long car journey recently - the tunes are splendid and the lyrics, though good, are a bit too clever-clever and self-consciously 'English' for my taste. I don't think Lerner & Loewe ever set anything in their homeland and three of their four 'biggies' are set in Britain.Originally posted by cloughie View PostComment
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The OP has inadvertently picked a fight with a woman who entirely lacks pomposity. While southern people look up to Coronation Street, northern people look down on Only Fools and Horses. She is the exception who has had the humility to recognise its intellectual worth. I think he needs to re-engage by mentioning Grimsby Town FC which is based in Cleethorpes and whose supporters - her? - wave plastic fish before moving swiftly on to Murakami's "A Downpour of Fish" which as he will know is the stage production of his "Kafka on the Shore".Comment
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I did time at a rugby playing school where, to confuse things, it was officially called "football", or possibly "rugby football". The 1st XV (the school gladiators) were the "football team". Hated it, then and now.Originally posted by teamsaint View Post
Soccer, if it was mentioned at all, was "Association football" (or, of course, soccer). Nowadays soccer more of an Americanism?Comment
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You missed out Wendy Pankhurst (grand daughter of Emmiline) who not only sang for Mike Oldfield but was (is?) a great music teacher.Originally posted by Conchis View PostComment
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Never heard of him. But on WS Gilbert: I'm not a fan of G&S, but when you pick on his 'Victorian pomposity', you miss the point. The pomposity is not Gilbert's: it's of the Victorian age. Gilbert is making fun of it. True, as with Shakespeare, the comedy has not always travelled well, but it travels better when it's understood.Originally posted by Conchis View Post
I had a distant relative who had a farm near Grimsby, but that's all I know about Cleethorpes.It isn't given us to know those rare moments when people are wide open and the lightest touch can wither or heal. A moment too late and we can never reach them any more in this world.Comment
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I encountered his Hamlet parody at school. All I can say is, satirist as he may have been, WSG had more than enough pomposity of his own to go round without ridiculing the pomposity of others.Originally posted by french frank View PostComment
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....Gosh Lat ....do you know any Grimsby Town terrace chants....Surely FISH< FISH , FISH must be one of them....We Are Going To Gut You ....perhaps Never Buy A Fish Who's Eyes Have Lost Their Lustre....[I suggest]bong chingComment
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....Well pomposity/Snobbery all rolling around in the same tub....What we need is a big melting pot, big enough to take the whirls of monoglot - keep it melting for a hundred years or more, spitting out covfefe folk on Cleethorpes Shore....
....and how near are snobbery and pomposity to....bigotry....bong chingComment
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