Gilbert and Sullivan

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 222, 8 December 1927, Page 16

Gilbert and Sullivan

A FAMOUS PARTNERSHIP

Uramatic Last Call

FOR tlie past eleven days Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera has been delighting Auckland audiences. Last evening a large “house” acclaimed with delight the performance of “The Gondoliers,” a piece hailed with immense enthusiasm at its premiere, and ranking to this day among the most popular of their works. But it was the last Gilbert and Sullivan work that really counted —the last produced by them before they quarrelled so seriously that despite a patched-np reconciliation their friendship was definitely destroyed.

r PHE story of the famous quarrel has long- been ascribed to a disagreement over a carpet for the Savoy Theatre. Although this was undoubtedly the cause of the final rupture, letters and diaries of the famous composer shortly to be published for the first time by Herbert Sullivan and Newman Flower, prove a longerstanding disagreement to be the real cause of the breaking up of the famous collaboration. It was the desire of Sullivan to compose music of a higher form than operetta that first sowed the seeds o£ discord. After composing “The Mikado” in 1885 this became more and more evident. Before completing his “Mikado” score he made strenuous efforts to tree himself from what he termed “this slavery.” Besides believing himself destined for better things than the creation of light music, Arthur Sullivan had the galling feeling that setting Gilbert’s words must always mean the subordination of music to text. With each opera produced he felt more keenly that he was condemned to playing second fiddle. SULLIVAN’S AMBITION Under date of January 9 of 1889 Sullivan made this entry in his diary: “Called Carte then Gilbert. Explained to latter my views as to the future, viz., that I wanted to do some dramatic work on a larger musical scale, and that of course I should like to do it with him if he would, but that the music must occupy a more important position than in other pieces—that I wished to get rid of the strongly marked rhythm and rhymed couplets, and have wards that would give a chance of developing musical effects. Also that I wanted a voice in the musical construction of the libretto.” Gilbert in reply urged Sullivan to stick to his work as composer of light music. He also argued eloquently against his collaborator’s objections to the fantastic nature of some of Gilberts librettos and to his desire for . their being more? serious and romantic. He considered the success of “The Yoemen” —which was a step in the direction of serious opera—had not been so convincing as to warrant them in assuming that the public wanted something more earnest still. “There is no doubt about it.” he said, “the more reckless and irresponsible the libretto has been the better the piece has succeeded.” Gilbert also suggested that they would be unwise in leaving altogether the path that they had trodden so long and successfully. “If,” he wrote, • vou can write an oratorio like The Martyr of Antioch,” while you ard occupied with pieces like ‘Patience’ and ‘lolanthe,’ can’t you write a grand opera without giving up pieces like the Yeomen of The Guard?” Are the two things irreconcilable. MORE ROMANTIC WOIRKS Sullivan thought they were. He confessed the indifference of the public toward "The Yeomen of the Guard” had disappointed him greatly. He had looked upon its success as opening out a field for works of a more serious and romantic character. “If the result means a return to our former style,” he wrote, “I must say at once, and with deep regret, that 1 cannot do it.” Much correspondence ensued. At one stage Gilbert wrote: “You are an adept in your .profession; I am an adept in mine. If we meet, it must be as master and master, not as master and servant.”

There were more letters, more recriminations;, the Gilbert-Sullivan partnership hung by a thread. Eventually. however, the difficulties were smoothed over, and Sullivan was able to make this entry in his diary on

May 9, 1889: “Long and frank explanation with Gilbert; shook hands and buried the hatchet.” And for the cause of English music it was a good thing, for it that before the year was out Gilbert and Sullivan were to present one of their most delightful and successful pieces, “The Gondoliers.” THE CARPET DISPUTE The last quarrel between them came a month after the triumphant premiere of “The Gondoliers.” It concerned the price of a carpet charged in the production costs of “The Gondoliers” at £ 500. This item Gilbert disputed with d’Oyly Carte, who shared with the collaborators in the profits of every piece. Sullivan sided with d’Oyly Carte in the carpet dispute, thereby greatly incensing Gilbert. One thing led to ajiother, until finally, on May 5, 1890, Sullivan wrote formally disbanding the collaboration. Once again Carte and others managed to patch up the quarrel. A truce was patched up somehow, and “Utopia, Limited,” was produced for the first time on October 7, 1893, but it won only a slight measure of success, while as for the next and last, “The Grand Duke,” it was a rank failure.

In the years that followed, when both strove, unaided by each other, and unsuccessfully, to “recapture the first fine careless rapture,” nothing could induce them to be friends again.

Nothing can better illustrate how deep the enmity had developed than an entry in Sullivan’s diary, written in 1898 —less than three years before he died.

One of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas had been revived at the Savoy, the scene of so many former triumphs. Both the collaborators had been begged by friends to take a curtain call together after the performance. They did, amidst tremendous applause. At home that night Sullivan wrote in his diary: “Tremendous house—ditto reception. Call for Gilbert and self —we went on together, but did not speak to each other.”

And so the comedy ended, but not on the usual Gilbertian note of happiness—Gilbert and Sullivan for once had turned to tragedy.