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Last Minute Light Opera SORCERER(How to get there - The Park Avenue Congregational Church, 50 Paul Revere Road, Arlington, MA On Sunday, March 21 at 2:00 PM, at the Park Avenue Congregational Church, 50 Paul Revere Road in Arlington MA. Conductor: David Larrick.
There are still a couple of roles open for this gala sing-through with orchestra: Dr. Daly and the Notary - while We remain willing to step aside for an eager young Aline. Email Program Chair Dave Leigh at preeta3@yahoo.com, or phone him at (781) 894-3009, if you want one of the roles. Here’s the cast list, as it stands currently:
See you there!
FEBRUARY: CARTOONS AT THE NEWTON FREE LIBRARY The G&S-related animated cartoons provided by NEGASS’s Don Smith were once more an almost-unqualified hit. We hope to see most of these again - but all present agreed that it’s time to find a replacement for Gentlemen of Titipu, despite Anna Russell’s voice. NEGASSers who were surprised to find the first cartoon half-over when they arrived at 2:00 learned later of the compromise that Program Chair Dave Leigh was forced to effect as a result of a miscommunication: the library had publicized 1:30, rather than 2, as the program start time. Later we enjoyed The Great Raffle Game... as Dave tells the story: “We had three prizes: the greeting cards [Tyson Vick’s original G&S note cards, mentioned in last month’s Bray], a CD of the 60's D'OC MIKADO, and an IDA score [Dave’s own piano-vocal edition, no less!]. We put the raffle tickets into one of Allegra [Martin]'s great big mittens, and I got children in the audience to reach in and pull out the winning tickets. The first volunteer, a girl of about thirteen with extremely red hair, reached in and pulled out a ticket, and I read the number aloud. The girl quietly replied, "that's mine." She handed me her stub for verification, and by an amazing coincidence, she had indeed drawn her own number. So the greeting cards were hers. The second volunteer, a boy of about seven, came up and drew a ticket, and I read the number. The winner was a little old lady about halfway back, who came up to the front and seemed quite happy and a little surprised that she'd won. I verified the number and the CD was hers. The third volunteer, a boy maybe nine, came up and drew a number, and after a pause, a voice said, "I think that's mine." The owner of the voice turned out to be none other than the boy who had done the second drawing. Thing was, he had no stub — he claimed he'd dropped it in the mitten when he'd come up the first time. It sounded pretty suspicious, but emptying out the mitten and searching for the other half of that particular ticket would have taken much more time than I was comfortable spending on the halftime entertainment, and the audience thought the whole thing was hilarious (someone even started singing "A Nice Dilemma"). In the end, I took the J. W. Wells approach and asked the audience to decide; the general consensus was to let him have the prize. I don't know what use he'd have of a IDA vocal score, but he's got one. And if it helps him become an avid G&S fan, then that's just fine by me.
UPCOMING MEETINGS:
MAY 2: ELECTIONS/FANTASY MEETING Yes, this was originally going to take place JUNE 6 - and then it was going to be May 16 - but the memory of last year’s extremely successful Election/Fantasy meeting, which was held in mid-May at the Park Avenue Congregational Church in Arlington, MA, have led the board to switch the date. ELECTIONS: This year Members-at-Large Linda Silverstein, Janice Dallas and Marion Leeds Carroll are up for re-election. So are our Vice President (Tony Parkes), Secretary (Jennifer Morris - who has already abdicated), and Program Chair (Dave Leigh). If you think you’d like to try - if you’d like to know more about these positions - please check out our contact info, and be in touch! Note: The three contested M-a-Ls actually hold extra roles, independent of our M-a-L positions: Linda is our Company Promoter, Janice is our Membership Chair, and We are the Bray editor/web-mistress... is anyone eager to take on part or all of any of these roles? We can share! FANTASIES: Last year we started out with an ad-hoc TRIAL, and went on to have a fabulous time playing around with gender-bending fantasies. What will it be this year? Come join us - throw your own fantasies into the pot, and see what happens!
Tentative Meeting Schedule, 2003-2004
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome We New Member Jay Madeira of Yarmouth, ME. Jay states that he's an 82 year old widower and retired. He played cello in a pit orchestra for RUDDIGORE many years ago and always regretted that he never got to see the show. Now he plays the banjo and enjoys attending the shows put on by The G&S Society of Hancock County. He wishes there were more groups performing G&S operettas.
We're hoping that someone will pick up the ball and organize another Singout. They take a lot of work to organize but, in the long run, they're a lot of fun. And so, from Ori, Len, Elspeth, Bill, and myself, we extend to you our heartfelt thanks for your support and understanding.
A NEGASS SINGOUT??? Shall
NEGASS host a Singout? It would be a lot of work. It would
take a lot of planning AMERICAN G&S ACTIVITIES SURVEY Hello, I am a researcher in American studies at the University of Nancy in France, where I am currently writing a paper about Gilbert and Sullivan’s popularity in the USA. I am trying to gain a better understanding of the role of American Gilbert and Sullivan societies. The survey should take just 5 to 10 minutes to fill out. I would greatly appreciate any information you wish to give me. I would be happy to share my findings with you if you are interested once the paper is published. -- RACHEL HUTCHINS Visit http://www.negass.org/bray/pdf/survey.pdf or http://www.negass.org/bray/pdf/survey.doc to download this survey. The PDF will yield a printable version which you can fill out and mail. The Word document is downloadable and printable, and it also gives you the option to fill it out on your computer and send it to Rachel as an email attachment. (Sorry - We have not had time to turn this into a Web form, as We’d intended!) We will also bring print-outs of this survey to the next NEGASS meeting.
D’OYLY CARTE TENOR’S PAGES: Jeff Cresswell (D'Oyly Carte tenor) has a website ... if you care to click on his site you'll find a host of info about the realities of the profession and being in the old company: Go to 'D'Oyly Days', follow the pics and you'll find some really interesting stuff.
FOREIGN-LANGUAGE G&S CDS - now, why didn’t We think to ask David Stieber? - Alan Combs, the conductor of the Andover Choral Society and voice teacher at the Phillips Andover Academy, is looking for sources of CD's and other recordings of G&S productions sung in German, Swedish, and other foreign languages. Don Smith replies: The only ones which I know are (or have been) commercially available are MIKADO in Spanish and Catalan; and MIKADO, PIRATES and PINAFORE in Yiddish; and PIRATES in Esperanto. Other items are strictly bootleg. Dave Leigh points out that the Esperanto PIRATES is out of print, and Carl Weggel adds that a Google search yields a review of Die Piraten written by Marc Shepherd and none other than Don Smith!
SLOC NEWS New Board elected at SLOC's Annual Meeting: Ron & I, being loyal "Ancestors" of the Savoyard Light Opera Company, attended their Annual Meeting on Feb. 8, 2004, in Carlisle [MA]. The major event of the meeting was the election of new Board members. Patti Lopoulos, Bob Russell, Brian Harris, and returning member Susan Schmidt, were elected to join present members, Rollin Jeglum, Tedford Armstead, and Craig Howard. There was a discussion of this past Fall's show, IOLANTHE. Everything went well and they made a profit. The Co-producer idea worked out so well that they will continue having them for the next show, The Secret Garden, coming next November.
COSTUMES and other theatrical supplies provided by The Performing Arts Supply Co. are used by the G&S Society of Houston, TX and other G&S groups - and, based on the brochure they’ve sent Us, they are very effective. Visit their web site to see more. &&& Looking for the reviews in this issue? Visit our new review page.
IN-PROGRESS PDF BRAY ARCHIVE We've been posting PDF versions of recent Brays on the web. What does this mean? It means that if you have a (free and easily accessible) copy of Adobe Acrobat Reader on your computer, you can print out a copy of the issue you want, looking pretty much the same as the copy you received in the mail - in case you lost your old copy, or want to give a copy to someone else. Ultimately, We hope to create a more nearly complete archive of old Brays in PDF format. NEW! INDEX TO RECENT ON-LINE BRAYS There are no links yet to the out-of-date calendar pages - but the articles are now available. Enjoy! - mlc Note: Very old issues of The Trumpet Bray are still available in The G & S Archives. ABOUT CONTRIBUTING TO THE TRUMPET BRAY:All contributions are welcome, of course - but, strictly speaking, only activities and articles relating to G&S ought to be published. (…although an occasional Yes We Know It's Not slips by when the subject relates to a promising activity presented by long-standing and active member of NEGASS.)
Visit http://leedscarroll.com/GSEnsembles.html for a list of G&S ensembles suitable for excerpt programs. Visit http://negass.org/Pages/Ads.html for a NEGASS business card image. |
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* ... why We see a neurologist...
Send electronic contributions to our e-mail address:pooh-bah at negass dot org
contact current webmaster mlc for more information
TORONTO
SINGOUT CANCELLED The
organizers write: Due to circumstances beyond our control, we will
be unable to proceed with the planned Toronto Gilbert and Sullivan
Singout. Many thanks to everyone who expressed interest in coming
- we're sorry things didn't pan out 'cause we were looking forward to
seeing old friends and meeting new ones.
,
and a chunk of cash up-front. It’s not something that we could throw
together in time for the summer of ’04 - it’s been estimated
that if we started now it might be ready in time for the summer of 2006.
Do we have people who’d be interested in taking on such a project?
Do we have an individual with the strength to coordinate such a group?
Let NEGASS know! - mlc 