- Radio Times
- Review by:
- David Butcher
Some Gilbert and Sullivan fans will have rushed to hear this when it was broadcast live on Radio 3 last Sunday. It’s a performance of the pair’s grandest, most bittersweet operetta, The Yeomen of the Guard, programmed as part of the London theme running through this year’s festival. Yeomen is arguably Gilbert’s finest libretto (and bristling with wordplay), set to Sullivan’s most ambitious score. And it’s the only one of their works to have been performed at the Royal Opera House.
Romance in Elizabethan England is dealt with in a plot that, for “light” opera, walks on the dark side. A strong cast is accompanied by the BBC Concert Orchestra under Jane Glover.
About this programme
From the Royal Albert Hall, Jane Glover conducts the BBC Concert Orchestra and BBC Singers in a performance of Gilbert and Sullivan's operetta The Yeomen of the Guard. Baritone Leigh Melrose stars as Lt Sir Richard Cholmondeley, alongside tenor Andrew Kennedy, soprano Lisa Milne and mezzos Victoria Simmonds and Felicity Palmer, and the director for this Proms production is Martin Duncan. Presented by Katie Derham.
Cast and crew
Cast
- Presenter
- Katie Derham
- Leigh Melrose
- Andrew Kennedy
- Lisa Milne
- Victoria Simmonds
- Felicity Palmer
- Mary Bevan
- Mark Richardson
- Tom Randle
- Mark Stone
- Toby Stafford-Allen
- BBC Singers
- Performer
- BBC Concert Orchestra
Crew
- Director
- Bridget Caldwell
- Producer
- John Williams
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