Leader, J. Mouland Begbie
Conductor, Guy Warrack Dorothy Pugh (soprano)

In an article on Rameau's Castor and Pollux, which appeared in the Radio Times, it was pointed out that Rameau's genius, like that of Franck and Verdi, came to a late flowering, for Castor and, Pollux (only his second opera among twenty-four stage-works) was produced when its composer was fifty-four, in 1737. It held the stage for about fifty years, after which it suffered neglect until the present century.
No knowledge of the opera's plot is necessary for the enjoyment of the old-world dances that recall beauties that Fragonard drew, low-hanging, wax-lit candelabras, and an assembly of fops and beaux where Voltaire's latest stinging epigram was passed around; in a word, all the glories of the ancien regime But it may help to know that in the prologue of the opera there appearsÂ
'Minerva, with attendant Arts,
Venus accompanied by her Graces,
Love with his train of Pleasures, and Mars.'

(D)