Sullivan: The Rose of Persia
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Composer: Arthur SullivanConductor: Tom Higgins
Orchestra: Hanover Band
Performer: Alison Roddy
Performer: Claire Henry
Performer: Claire Pendleton
Performer: Ian Caddy
Performer: Ivan Sharpe
Performer: Jonathan Viera
Performer: Lynton Black
Performer: Marcia Bellamy
Performer: Marilyn Hill Smith
Performer: Richard Edgar-Wilson
Performer: Richard Morrison
Performer: Richard Stuart
Performer: Sally Harrison
Edition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2005-08-16
Music Label: Cpo Records
Soundtracks:
Music CD 1
- Act 1. Overture
- Act 1. As we lie in languor lazy
- Act 1. When Islam first arose
- Act 1. O life has put into my hand
- Act 1. Sunbeam! The Priest keeps saying
- Act 1. If you ask me to advise you
- Act 1. 'Neath my lattice
- Act 1. Tramps and scamps
- Act 1. When my father sent me
- Act 1. Peace be upon this house
- Act 1. Musical maidens are we
- Act 1. Peace be upon this house
- Act 1. The Sultan's Executioner
- Act 1. I'm the Sultan's Vigilant vizier
- Act 1. O luckless hour!
- Act 2. Oh, what is love?
- Act 2. If you or I should tell the truth
- Act 2. From Morning Pray'r
- Act 2. Let a satirist enumerate a catalogue of crimes
- Act 2. In the heart of my hearts I've always known
- Act 2. Suppose - I say, suppose
- Act 2. Laughing low, on toe-tip
- Overture
- Overture
- Overture
- Overture
- Overture
- Act 2. There was once a small Street Arab
- Act 2. A bridal march
Music reviews of Sullivan: The Rose of Persia
Music Review: What Might have Been!
Rating: 3 Stars
This is definitely a "modified rapture" product. As I own only a highlights disc (which includes over half of The Rose of Persia), I will discuss that performance only.
My biggest problem with the recording is the selection of Sally Harrison as Rose-in-Bloom. In her song, "Neath my lattice," she sings the original Ellen Beach Yaw cadenza, but sings it a minor third lower than Yaw did (A-flat rather than B). This would be fine if that enabled her to sing it. Her E-flat's near the end of the piece are truly painful. She is practically screaming her notes out. I don't know how it got issued. (Happily, there is a remedy to this dilemma. A fine singer posted her live recording of the work in it's original B major version on the Gilbert and Sullivan Archive.)
Aside from that, a number of the rest of the cast is only so-so, unhappily. This opera contains fine music, but needs to be recorded again. The tenor who sings Yussuf, Ivan Sharpe, sounds very inflexible at times, often expending great effort to get to his high notes (I am Tenor, hear me roar). Still, he does reach whenever he needs to. Marcia Bellamy's Dancing Sunbeam doesn't exactly sound like a contralto, but she sings well enough regardless.
Overall, soloists generally sound very strained on high notes. One oddity is that the lady's chorus has a bizarre flute-like timbre on higher notes. I don't know how to explain it. It sounds almost like they were being accompanied by an electric keyboard choir (which we know is not the case).
Despite all these negative comments, I still believe this to be a decent reading of Hood and Sullivan's work. It is the best we shall have for the foreseeable future. Others have mentioned Tom Higgins lively conducting, and on the whole, I agree: the orchestral contribution is fine.
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