Summary: G&S Companion
MUSIC 730 -- Professor Steven Gerber -- 2/5/17
- Summary of Eden, David, and Meinhard Saremba, editors, The Cambridge Companion to Gilbert and Sullivan (Cambridge 2009).
The structure of the book follows the developmental timeline of the duo’s operettas, as well as including auxiliary chapters which delve into more specific topics, such as literary influences on Gilbert’s libretti or how the patter song became structured and refined over time. In particular, I plan on using a chapter entitled “Motives and methods in Sullivan’s allusions”, in which the authors discuss the similarities of Sullivan’s music and the structure of mid-century Italian opera, such as the large ensembles that appear in the works by Giuseppe Verdi.
This resource also includes more logistical elements of the operettas, such as the reception and how they fit in to the greater scheme of a national school of English music in the nineteenth century. Both the musical style and the structure of the libretti are included in the discussion. In addition to this, infrastructure is also discussed, with the prevalence of Gilbert and Sullivan operettas being used in amateur productions forming an interesting talking point. I intend to use this resource heavily, as well as finding additional resources that related to my topic through this book’s bibliography.