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Afternoon Concert: Thursday Opera Matinee: Arthur Sullivan - The Beauty Stone

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Music: Classical: Opera

BBC National Orchestra of Wales

13/02/2014

Arthur Sullivan - The Beauty Stone

BBC Radio 3 - Afternoon Concert

Penny Gore presents Arthur Sullivan's operetta The Beauty Stone performed by BBC NOW.

Penny Gore presents Sullivan's operetta The Beauty Stone performed by Elin Manahan Thomas, Toby Spence, BBC National Chorus and Orchestra of Wales conducted by Rory Macdonald.

Sullivan: The Beauty stone - operetta
The Beauty Stone, an "original romantic musical drama in three acts", was premiered at the Savoy theatre in 1898 but has waited until now for its first professional recording. Set in the fifteenth century, the mixture of magic and medieval chivalry, Sullivan's hoped to create a work halfway between the romantic flights of his grand opera Ivanhoe and the wit of his earlier Savoy operas. Sullivan's lengthy grand-operatic musical numbers and his serious exploration proved too much for his Savoy audiences used to the ready wit of the Gibert and Sullivan operas and the work closed after just fifty performances. But the Beauty Stone contains some of Arthur Sullivan's finest music as his characters react to the beauty stone with a mixture of yearning, despair and love.
The opera is set in the Flemish town of Mirlemont at the beginning of the 15th century and the plot is one part Faustian saga, one part Brothers Grimm fairy tale. A young girl, Liane, has a beautiful soul, but is not pretty, and dreams of marrying a Prince. The Devil gives her the Beauty Stone, which is passed around the whole cast, with many confusions resulting. There is a beauty contest, and the prince realises the beauty of Liane's soul and marries her.
Presented by Penny Gore.

Philip, Lord of Mirlemont ..... Toby Spence (tenor)
Guntran of Beaugrant ..... David Stout (bass)
Simon Limal ..... Stephen Gadd (baritone)
Nicholas Dircks ..... Richard Suart (baritone)
The Devil ..... Alan Opie (baritone)
Laine ..... Elin Manahan Thomas (soprano)
Joan ..... Catherine Wyn-Rogers (mezzo-soprano)
Jacqueline ..... Madeleine Shaw (mezzo-soprano)
Saida ..... Rebecca Evans (soprano)
Loyse ..... Olivia Gomez (soprano)
Isabeau ..... Sarah Maxted (mezzo-soprano)
Barbe ..... Llio Evans (soprano)
also featuring Peppin, a dwarf, Baldwyn of Ath
The Lords of Serault, Velaines, and St Sauveur, a Seneschal, a Lad of the Town, a Shrewish Girl, a Matron, Knights, Dames, Pages, Aldermen, Soldiers, Townsfolk, Country-folk, Dancers, Lute-players, Serving-men, and the rest
BBC National Chorus of Wales
BBC National Orchestra of Wales
Rory Macdonald (conductor).

Afternoon Concert: Thursday Opera Matinee

Thursday Opera Matinee

Live music and the arts: broadcasts more live music than any other radio network. Classical music is its core. Genres include world and new music, jazz, speech and drama.

Series of fifteen operas recently recorded at some of world's greatest opera houses

Series of operas performed at venues around the world. Singers such as Bryn Terfel, Anna Netrebko, Simon Keenlyside and Joyce DiDonato perform under conductors including Seiji Ozawa and Simon Rattle

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Arthur Sullivan - The Beauty Stone

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