The Magazine Project

[flowersofnight]

SWicH 22, Dec. 1996
Main point of interest this time is a report on Malice Mizer's activities in late 1996, around the time of their 5-city tour to promote the "ma cherie" single. There's an event report from Niigata (with photos), and an interview with Gackt and Kozi. Gackt was apparently incensed about persistent rumors that he was gay I translated that bit of it here: https://www.scapeforums.com/index.php?threads/contemporary-reviews-of-music.6177/#post-341293

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/swich22.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/swich22_150dpi.pdf

By the way, it seems that SWicH #7 has a live report from Lareine's very early days when they were still known as LALIENE. Does anyone have it?



Next, as promised: we jump from the mid-'70s back to March 1935 for an earlier era at the Savoy. For those keeping score this is roughly 40 years since the final opera, "The Grand Duke", closed its original run, 35 years since Sullivan's death, and 25 since Gilbert's. The overall tone is somewhat more whimsical and eclectic than the 1970s run - we see "in-universe" fan speculation and even outright irrelevancies in the mix.

Notable entries this time:
- The D'Oyly Carte Company was on tour and played "The Mikado" in Boston. A censorous dentist (whose name has now utterly vanished from public record) wrote into the newspapers to complain that the opera "satirises all government and thus undermines the minds of growing children and robs them of all respect for discipline and society" For those of you overseas who may not know, although Boston is most commonly associated with campus libertinism now, up until relatively recently it was America's most active hotbed of censorship and many famous works were "banned in Boston" as the saying went. Later in the issue is more details about the American tour.
- An explanation of "rolling down One Tree Hill" from "The Sorcerer" - this reference was apparently already obscure by the '30s. In the production I saw last weekend it was duly footnoted.
- A number of Society functions in November 1934 and onward seem to have been cancelled due to fog - see footage here

. Can't say I blame them.
- A glossary for "Trial by Jury". I can only assume this sort of thing wasn't included as endnotes to the libretti at the time, as it is now.
- Review of a two-volume book called "Theatre and Stage" (Harold Downs, ed.) which seems to have contained much detailed information and photographs on how staging and performance were done for various works including all the Savoy operas. It can be bought from used booksellers for relatively cheap - maybe I will.
- The difference between New York and London audiences: New Yorkers don't demand encores by clapping incessantly till they get one

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_mar35.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_mar35_150dpi.pdf

 

[flowersofnight]

SWicH 14, Apr. 1996

Nothing particularly notable in this issue - bands as pictured on the cover.
That Mana cosplayer actually took home another grand prize cosplaying a ROUAGE member some 8 months prior. I sort of feel that something was not entirely unrotten in the proverbial state of Denmark.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/swich14.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/swich14_150dpi.pdf

Skipping ahead over another gap, we have March 1937 on the Strand. This issue of G&SJ isn't complete - the cover and some interior pages are missing. But what is there has some notable bits:
- Thoughts on filming the operas - everyone is unanimously aghast at the idea of Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, or Shirley Temple sucking all the oxygen out of the Savoy classics.
- Some speculation on how to pronounce the name "Ruthven" in Ruddigore, the knowledge apparently having been lost already by this time (?!) Modern productions seem to go with the suggestion made here.
- A review of an early Ruddigore recording on what I presume to have been shellac 78s. In the last issue I posted these were advertised in the inside front cover - each opera took about a dozen records and I'm sure the quality would be barbarous to modern ears.
- AND... a nightmarish experience at a New York D'Oyly Carte performance, which I just have to reproduce in full:

Then Let the Agonies Commence
By Henry B. Williams

I had never seen a professional production of Ruddigore. I had come to believe that that anomaly didn't even exist, and I had begun to resign myself to my fate when the D'Oyly Carte company came along and saved me. I was to be in New York one week-end last October and everything looked fine. One night found me ensconced in the Martin Beck Theatre with about five minutes to spare.
Up to this time the three seats beside mine had remained vacant. Then a party of three came in: two gentlemen and a lady. With characteristic courtesy they allowed the lady to go in first. She took the seat next to me. She was youngish and very mild. The gentleman in the middle rather exuberant, and the one on the end seat of the strong silent variety. He needed to be!
It wasn't very long before the exuberant one informed the female, and everyone else within the surrounding two or three rows, that he had been in Ruddigore. That he had not only been in it but had actually played the part of Richard Dauntless. He added that he was very good indeed. There was no discernible reaction from the female nor from "strength and silence" on his right, and he turned to me. I pretended I hadn't heard but he suspected me and he was right in guessing that I was his most interested auditor.
The orchestra entered the pit and after them the conductor. Our hero was going on in a steady stream, remarking on everything, from the location of the seats to the colour of the conductor's hair. And then, as the conductor raised his baton, our hero rolled his programme in direct imitation and started to lead along with him. It is impossible to describe the gusto he put into it or the flair with which he went at it. But, alas, this enthusiasm was short lived. After the very first repeat of the "When the night Wind howls" theme he came to a mystified stop. "Why that's not the right overture! That isn't the overture we used!" It was completely impossible for me to ignore him; the bend of the row and that waving programme provided a fascination that completely submerged both orchestra and overture.
When the curtain rose my hero deftly pointed out all the points of interest about the setting. He even defined and catalogued them. "That's Rose Maybud's house - That's the sea-port - There's where so-and-so enters and another thing happens here," and so on. The end of the opening chorus caught him right in the midst of all this and left him a trifle surprised. "That's a rather pretty little thing for an opening chorus."
But soon another menace began to assert itself. As the opera progressed the music became more familiar and began, like a heady wine, to inebriate him. He tried, valiantly, to fight this off but he couldn't. The fact is that he was drunk - drunk with fifty-year-old Sullivan port. And so he started to hum! After Rose's number, he announced that HE came in next. He was Richard. He had ceased to sit in the audience and his spirit had soared on to the stage and was waiting in the wings for its entrance music. This was really the first chance I had to check up on him - and I found him wanting. He did not come on next. His soul would have to wait until Robin Oakapple made his entrance and sang a duet with Rose. . . . Robin's entrance further disconcerted him because the female turned and asked if that was the part he played. Poor woman. I pitied her. He was in a bad spot but he got round it. "Oh yes, there is this song here. I had forgotten all about it. There's this song and then mine." After all, what's a duet when you're straining for Richard?
At last came the crashing chord that starts the symphony of "From the briny Sea." They make seats too small in theatres nowadays for such as he. That chord transformed him into a combination of Ariel and Caliban, wth most of the votes going to the latter. He literally jumped, pounded and writhed. I feared for the people in front for I thought he was going to do a somersault right over their heads. I didn't see Richard (the real one) make his entrance; I was so worried about the spiritual one two seats away. Here was his chance and he took it. He sang along with the actor in a voice that he imagined was sotto voce and which I didn't. Robin's solo found him going gaily along in an exuberant mood but it also found him unprepared for the spoken interpolations of Richard. They surprised him, but he justified himself by stating that they were something the D'Oyly Carte had stuck in and weren't in the original. Things went on in that manner until the end of the act. By that time I was slightly callous.
When I went back to my seat for the second act I saw to my horror and amazement that the party had rearranged themselves, and that I was to have him next to me! They were conversing rather heatedly - or at least he was. I caught the end of his discourse which turned on the comparative merits of the actor who was playing Richard and his own performance. I gathered that, being a magnanimous soul, he thought that the actor was almost as good.
In the opening number he started right in with Ruthven and Old Adam and simply went overboard with the "Ha Has" on the end of each line. I was becoming violent. He was bad enough two seats away, but right next door. . . . I am mild by nature; that is, I don't like scenes. But when I am provoked I am as good as the next one. And I was thoroughly provoked. I turned on him and uttered a loud shhhh! It frightened him - and subdued him - for a moment. I turned away. Through the corner of my eye I could see him looking full at me much in the same manner that people look at things in cages at the zoo. Alas, that shhh had its effect only for a moment. He came to himself and picked up the thread where he had left off. Unfortunately for me where he picked up the thread was another entrance of Richard. Why, it was an invitation. He forgot me completely and sailed right in. He didn't get very far; I saw to that.
A particular favourite of mine is Roderic's song, and I wasn't going to have that ruined. I turned on him. "I beg your pardon, but I think I know this opera as well as you do, and I came here to hear the D'Oyly Carte do it. I know all the songs, dialogue and plot, but I want to see how they do it. Will you please keep quiet and allow me to enjoy it?" I turned away towards the stage, but I was careful to watch the effect. The world had crashed about his ears. He was hurt, beaten, mute. I was satisfied.
The ghosts were beginning to emerge from their frames. I watched them and him. No sound, only that hurt expression. And then a change; he turned to the female on his right and said softly, but so that I could hear, "I don't think this person next to me likes Gilbert and Sullivan."

[The recital of this harrowing tale has had to be curtailed somewhat. Our sympathies go to Mr. Williams, who perhaps will console himself with the thought that this type is, unfortunately, not peculiar to New York. - ED.]

Seriously, hit "click to expand", this is something else

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_mar37_incomplete.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_mar37_incomplete_150dpi.pdf

 

[heutre]

View attachment 2019

SWicH 14, Apr. 1996

wow the scans are really high quality. Thanks for archiving and sharing

 

[flowersofnight]

SWicH 21, Nov. 1996
This has nothing in particular to recommend it - bands as featured on the cover. This copy is incomplete, as pages 11 and 12 (on SIAM SHADE) are missing.
This finishes off my SWicH issues, next time we'll get back to more substantial fare.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/swich21_incomplete.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/swich21_incomplete_150dpi.pdf

In G&SJ, we're now at June 1937. Featured this time:
- The alternate ending to "Ruddigore"
- Discussion on whether G&S had burned out by the time of the carpet quarrel
- A glossary for "The Gondoliers"
- A reader writes in with data on how frequently the D'Oyly Carte performed the operas. The top five (in the 1930s or thereabouts) were "The Mikado", "The Gondoliers", "The Yeomen of the Guard", "Iolanthe", and "Ruddigore". "HMS Pinafore" and "Patience" were deeply out of favor. Of course, things are much different today when the "Big Three" are "Pirates of Penzance", "Pinafore", and "Mikado". Unless you happen to live in New York or London, seeing any of the others live would be unusual.
- British fans complain about the D'Oyly Carte spending too much time in America. Reminds me of sour Moi dix Mois fangirls complaining when Mana went to Europe.
- AND... the guy from "Let The Agonies Commence" last issue got his happy ending - someone who read that article got him a ticket to see "Patience" later in the New York tour. And, we are assured, he loved it.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jun37.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jun37_150dpi.pdf

 

[flowersofnight]

Après Guerre Vol. 17 (11/1996)

Bands as featured on the cover - there's a 3-page interview with La:Sadie's (as well as some ads for them), and an interview with BLUE's original lineup (with Hayato but without Arihito/Akane).
But more interestingly: a genuine discovery. In the "Neo Cult Night" live report, we see a solo live performance by Devie, later of Divine Voltaire!



He appears here as a black-clad New Wave sort of artist doing Indian/Asian-inspired music - which is to say, hints of what he would start doing in a few months with Divine Voltaire. The reviewer had nothing but praise for the tension, atmosphere, and impression he created. Something to make a note of, I suppose, on the infinitesimal chance a bootleg of this live ever surfaces.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre17.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre17_150dpi.pdf

Skipping over another small hole in my collection, we advance to March 1938's G&SJ.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_mar38.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_mar38_150dpi.pdf

This time around:
- A review of "The Gondoliers" on 78rpm records, featuring Derek Oldham (G&S Society membership card #1) and others. These seem to have already been out-of-date due to the rapid advance of recording technology but I'm sure all of it would be considered nigh-unlistenable today.
- A prewar tour of G&S-related sites in London. Apparently John Wellington Wells' "70 St. Mary Axe" didn't exist back then, but it does today (as a huge office building).
- A reader from Tokyo (!) writes in about Jane Austen independently inventing one of Sir Ruthven's daily crimes
- A detailed description of this caricature of Ignatius Paul Pollaky to explain a reference in "Patience". Back then printing a picture would have involved producing a custom halftone block, which presumably was out of the question.
- AND... it's revealed for the first time that dentist who demanded the banning of "The Mikado", as covered in the March 1935 issue, turned out to have written his letter as a joke

 

[flowersofnight]

Après Guerre Vol. 14 (5/1996)

This one's mostly for Dir en grey ride-or-die fans - features an interview with La:Sadie's as well as some live reportage with photos.
Yes, the covers are dirty, and no, I'm not making any attempt to clean them up either physically or photographically XD

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre14.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre14_150dpi.pdf

Moving on to June 1938 in G&SJ:

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jun38.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jun38_150dpi.pdf

This time we have:
- Trepidation over the upcoming first film adaptation of a Savoy opera: "The Mikado" which indeed would come out in 1939. I haven't seen it.
- Notes on two forgotten operas, "The Beauty Stone" and "His Excellency". The former has been recorded recently, the latter probably never will be.
- The Journal starts an "information service" where anyone, even non-members, could write in with a question and for 1 shilling (about $3 in today's money) they'd research and answer it. Of course, if you were a non-member you'd have to fork over another shilling to buy the issue with the reply Members got all this gratis.
- A play and a book representing Gilbert and Sullivan's personal lives - sort of 1930s predecessors of "Topsy-Turvy".
- A debate on "signature tunes" at society meetings. Apparently in the '30s there was a "craze" for these, and at meetings of social organizations they would all sing the signature tune. The G&S Society's tune in 1938 was "The Englishman" but "certain members confessed to feeling very self-conscious" when singing it XD Japan hands may recall that this practice survived much longer over there, and you'd hear about corporate board meetings wrapping up with a group rendition of "Rokko Oroshi".
- Five votes taken at the March '38 meeting:
* "There was no real joke in Gilbert making play of the fact that Sir Joseph Porter was a civilian First Lord of the Admiralty, as it is always so": Rejected
* "Are encores desirable?": Yes
* "The tempi of the operas are very often taken too fast or too slow": Unclear
* "Did Gilbert deliberately mix up the ages of his characters or was it an oversight?" : Unclear
* " 'The Englishman' is an inappropriate 'anthem' for an international society": Yes, and then at the May annual general meeting it was decided to go without a song.

 

[flowersofnight]

Jazz Information Vol. II No. 16 (November 1941)

This is the final issue of a semi-legendary jazz publication run by noted critic Ralph J. Gleason. It ran from September 1939 to November 1941 and focused on "hot" or New Orleans-style jazz as opposed to the newer styles of swing, bop, etc. "J.I." seems to have quickly garnered a reputation for being a "collector's" magazine since it championed an older style of music and therefore attracted the types who collect rare old records. (Sound familiar?) Their newsgathering and criticism was ostensibly a step up from other publications like "Down Beat", but I couldn't really say one way or the other. As far as the contents of this issue, there are original features on the legendary James P. Johnson (pictured on the cover) as well as other jazzmen - including Jelly Roll Morton who had just died shortly before publication. There's also a huge amount of record reviews. Again, it's not like I've heard any of these old 78s, but it's interesting to see what people thought of Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, and all the rest back when they were active artists rather than plaster saints.

Even though this magazine isn't that hard to come by (there's one right now on Ebay for $10), nobody has ever bothered to scan or transcribe it, presumably because it's over 100 pages long. So, I'm putting it here in case any wandering googlers come across it.

Wikipedia has some archive links to transcriptions (not scans) of many of the older issues:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jazz_Information#Online_transcriptions,_current_and_archived

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/jazzinformation_nov41.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/jazzinformation_nov41_150dpi.pdf

For your amusement, here's one of the new records reviewed in this issue: Meade "Lux" Lewis playing boogie-woogie blues on an authentic harpsichord

 

[flowersofnight]

Après Guerre Vol. 19 (3/1997)

Another one mainly of interest to Dir en grey fans - this issue came right after La:Sadie's broke up and the ex-members went on to form Dir en grey and MIRAGE, both of which are featured and interviewed here. This contains the first of many non-answers about "What does 'Dir en grey' mean?"

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre19.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre19_150dpi.pdf


September 1938's G&SJ finds us deep into the filming of 1939's "The Mikado", and the editor was invited behind the scenes to see and hear what was going on. The creative team very obviously wanted to assuage the fears of the diehard Savoyards - we are assured by writer Geoffrey Toye that "his stars are Gilbert and Sullivan", and we are told that "not a word that is not Gilbert, or a note that is not Sullivan, will be heard".
Interestingly, we seem to be back before auteur theory ruled the day - the writer clearly gets top billing here, and director Victor Schertzinger is described as merely applying his "technical expertise" to film the film. At any rate, the G&SJ editor came away very favorably impressed, and relieved that Big Hollywood didn't get its claws into the opera and rewrite it.

Other features:
- A reprinted article from The Times arguing (in so many words) that the D'Oyly Carte productions are too stiflingly conservative. This notion was debated endlessly up until the company's dissolution in 1982, and beyond.
- A tour of the Tower of London, and articles on the Tower, to celebrate the 50th anniversary of "Yeomen of the Guard", whose scene is set there.
- A reader writes in with references to contemporary criticism in "Punch" magazine. There were apparently some others listed in the June 1935 G&SJ (which I don't have), and this reader found some that the original correspondent missed.
- A detailed comparison of Tennyson's "The Princess" to "Princess Ida"

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_sep38.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_sep38_150dpi.pdf

 

[flowersofnight]

Après Guerre Vol. 20 (5/1997)

Nothing much of interest here. The BLUE interview has the first appearance of Arihito (formerly Akane of oxbxjxe), but they don't really get into his past other than "You made an impression in previous bands, huh." Must have wanted a fresh start.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre20.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre20_150dpi.pdf

Moving on to December 1938's G&SJ:

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_dec38.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_dec38_150dpi.pdf

This time around we have:
- The hype train continued to build for the "Mikado" movie. The premiere was to be a gala fundraiser for the Boy Scouts - founder and national hero Lord Baden-Powell still being alive but nearing the end of his life at the time.
- Information on the whereabouts of various artifacts from Grim's Dyke (Gilbert's personal mansion). Although in the 1970s issues of G&SJ we saw it in operation as a privately-owned hotel, at this point in time the estate was publicly owned, having been purchased by the Middlesex County Council. The contents were "presented to the nation", but it's anyone's guess as to how much of the specific locations are still accurate 86 years later.
- A performance of an early Gilbert play, "Tom Cobb"
- Continuation of last issue's article on "The Princess" and "Princess Ida"

 

[flowersofnight]

Après Guerre Vol. 21 (7/1997)

There's an interview and photographic live reportage on Dir en grey here, and nothing much of interest that aside. I wonder if the reason DEG took the indies world by absolute storm wasn't at least partly because absolutely nothing was going on at the time.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre21.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre21_150dpi.pdf

Next time: something different that I can't wait to translate

In G&SJ we advance to the new year, March 1939.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_mar39.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_mar39_150dpi.pdf

The big event this time, of course, is the premiere of "The Mikado" movie. Reactions were apparently all over the place, from enthusiastic praise to utter condemnation. Many G&SJ readers wrote in (from the perspective of diehard Savoyards, of course) and most of them were incensed. The editor had praise for the music and staging but complained that Gilbert's wit, in particular, was lost in the mix. It seems like author Geoffrey Toye's promise of "no word that is not Gilbert's and no note that is not Sullivan's" was kept to the letter, but perhaps not in the spirit - there were cuts and rearrangements of the material. And apparently there were at least a few people who thought Walt Disney should have done the adaptation!

85 years later the movie seems to have been remembered well enough - it got a Criterion Collection blu-ray release not that long ago.

Apart from that, notable features this time were some authentic contemporary criticism from the premiere of "Trial by Jury", and notes on the premiere of "Utopia Limited".

 

[flowersofnight]

Mercure vol. 4 (ca. September 1996)

Here's an obscurity with a few somewhat-interesting things in it. There's a feature on Stella Maria (one of Kisaki's old bands prior to La:Sadie's) and a personal interview with Akane of C'est La vie... in which he just blathers about Virtua Fighter for two whole pages
But most amusing of all is a feature in which two fangirls are interviewed by a bartender about which bandmen they like best in various ways I wonder if other issues also have this XD

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/mercure4.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/mercure4_150dpi.pdf

June 1939's Gilbert and Sullivan Journal has a number of interesting items:

- Coverage of the "Swing Mikado" and "Hot Mikado" - the latter of which famously starred Bill "Bojangles" Robinson. These so-called "negro productions" received a generally scathing reception from the hard-line Savoyards comprising the staff and readership of G&SJ. Today they're remembered and even sometimes performed - although I think people like the idea of these shows as much if not more than the shows themselves.
The productions referenced in this issue were on Broadway in New York, but the "Hot Mikado" was later performed at the 1939 Chicago World's Fair, where it was quite popular. A little bit of footage survives:

- A reproduction of the Times' original review of "The Sorcerer" on its opening night in 1877, which was very favorable on the whole.
- Reminder that if you refer 10 new members to the G&S Society in one year, you get a CUSTOM ASHTRAY! 5 new members will get you a certificate.
- Dr. Thomas Baty writes in from "Tokio" about some productions at the Urakuza Theatre some years ago (the theatre itself having burned down in 1923), and everyone has a chuckle at the notion of rendering English words in katakana.
- Notes on a full concert performance of "Utopia Limited".
- More reader commentary on the "Mikado" film (mostly negative)

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jun39.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jun39_150dpi.pdf

Next time: war!

 

[flowersofnight]

King Arthur: His magical history (1970)

Music: Henry Purcell
Original libretto: John Dryden
Adapted by: Colin Graham

Here's a curiosity from around the time the early-music movement was first getting into gear: an adaptation of the great Henry Purcell's semi-opera "King Arthur".
Most people, if they know this work at all, know it primarily for the "Cold Song", famously covered by Klaus Nomi, Susumu Hirasawa, and others. The reason for this is that despite the brilliance of the music, the opera itself is nearly unstageable. Unlike modern operas, this semi-opera has a strict division between speaking and singing roles - and so King Arthur, Merlin, and all the characters we know from legend play no part in the music. What's more, the plot is rather thin, rambling, and digressive - often more like a masque or court entertainment than a story. In a way, it was the baroque equivalent of a special-effects extravaganza movie.
As far as I'm aware, "King Arthur" has only been staged "straight" once in living memory, back in 1995 (the audio recording by Les Arts Florissants, available on CD, is excellent). Every now and then it's revived, but always in the highest Regietheater mode - producers invariably decide that the best way to deal with an impossible libretto is just to lean into the absurdity and play it as total farce.

This adaptation from 1970 presents a third option: editing down Dryden's libretto, reassigning roles, and taking musical selections from both "King Arthur" itself and Purcell's wider oeuvre to make a new, coherent story that works as a serious opera. Purists would (and did) object, and it's of course nothing like what Purcell himself envisioned in terms of performance, but it's an interesting experiment and uses little or no material that didn't already exist in the 17th century.

As an example of the adaptation process: another one of Purcell's biggest hits, "Your hay it is mow'd" (or the "pudding and dumpling song") was originally sung by allegorical figures in the rambling fifth act. The adaptation moves this into the action of the play, where one of the evil fairies gets the British soldiers drunk and leads them off singing this drinking song, allowing the villain's plot to unfold.

The files:

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kingarthur.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kingarthur_150dpi.pdf
Pages 49-50 of the booklet (51-52 in the PDF) have the index of musical numbers and their sources.

To see the original libretto as written by Dryden/Purcell:
http://www.operalib.eu/zpdf/kingarthur.pdf
(This isn't my work)

 

[flowersofnight]

カネコヂル (kanekodiru) 1, 9/2000

This publication seems to have dealt more in the underground and/or electronic side of indies music. Most notably, this issue features the only known live reportage on Atsushi Fukuyama's band "Recall". But for anyone interested there's also material on Metronome, Guruguru Eigakan, Onan Spelmermaid, and other miscellaneous acts that people might conceivably remember.
The magazine seems to have persisted for quite some time - the latest reference I could find online was to an issue #33 from May 2012.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kanekodiru1.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kanekodiru1_150dpi.pdf



Gilbert & Sullivan Journal Emergency Issues, 1939-1940

Britain declared a state of war with Germany on September 3, 1939. Although "The Blitz" wouldn't take place until the following year, all "places of entertainment" were closed and public gatherings curtailed immediately following prime minister Neville Chamberlain's announcement of the war.
It seems that there was an expectation of immediate or even instant retaliation from Germany, as blackouts, evacuations, Underground shutdowns, and air raid precautions were immediately enacted. Some sort of restrictions on mailing seem to have been in place as well.
https://www.bbc.com/historyofthebbc/anniversaries/september/war-announced

In the theatrical world, Society meetings were cancelled (although private gatherings did take place at members' houses) and the D'Oyly Carte company itself was disbanded (unlike during the First World War). The "emergency" Journal issues were reduced in size to 12 pages, though it's not specified whether this was due to a lack of time/money for typesetting and printing, or an actual shortage of paper. Three emergency issues were printed, in October 1939, January 1940, and April 1940. I don't know when regular Society activity resumed as my collection jumps ahead to the mid-1950s after this.
The emergency issues are considered part of Vol. V.

October 1939:
- The editors inform readers that no topical wartime parodies will be accepted. God bless them for holding the line.
- A contemporary first-night review of "HMS Pinafore" from the London Times.
- More discussion of the Mikado film
- A debate on the Bab Ballads apparently prompted by the New York branc
- Upcoming meetings planned for November, December, and January - air raid provisions being available onsite.

January 1940:
- The D'Oyly Carte was reconstituted and gave a performance of "Iolanthe" on Christmas 1939 as the start of a Scottish tour.
- A complete Savoy opera was broadcast on the BBC for the first time on November 5 1939: "Trial by Jury". This was a perennial bone of contention between the BBC and the D'Oyly Carte - the latter insisting that the only way to hear a full G&S opera should be from a live performance at their theater. Recall that the operas were still under copyright at this time and would be for a couple decades more.
- A music education program using Sullivan's music for "percussion band" (??)
- Notes on the setting on "Iolanthe"

April 1940:
- Notes on a new production of "Yeomen of the Guard"
- Much discussion of Frederic's 21st birthday on February 29
- Members having to change to "country" memberships or drop out due to evacuations etc. seem to have been numerous.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_oct39.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_oct39_150dpi.pdf

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jan40.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jan40_150dpi.pdf

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_apr40.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_apr40_150dpi.pdf

 

[flowersofnight]

Ochiai Yoshiiku
Museum exhibition catalogue, Ota Memorial Museum of Art, 2018

Ochiai Yoshiiku (落合 芳幾), also known as Utagawa Yoshiiku (歌川 芳幾) was an ukiyo-e artist of the late Meiji period, one of the last true masters of the craft. He was a student of Utagawa Kuniyoshi, and rival to his fellow student Tsukioka Yoshitoshi. While his "bloody prints" and supernatural scenes are perhaps best remembered today, he worked in all the major genres of ukiyo-e including actor portraits, samurai, beautiful women, comedic scenes, historical scenes, and so on. In addition to standalone art prints he also produced art for various illustrated newspapers of his day.
Unlike his contemporary Yoshitoshi, Yoshiiku's work is seldom collected in book form, either in Japan or overseas. This museum catalogue from a 2018 exhibition is surprisingly one of the very few books on the man or his art.
The photocollages on the covers give an indication of the range of Yoshiiku's work - I highly recommend taking a look.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/yoshiiku.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/yoshiiku_150dpi.pdf

For further reading, you can try to get your hands on a copy of the super-deluxe 1971 "血の晩餐" ("Banquet of Blood" - sounds like a Malice Mizer outtake), which features the "bloody prints" of both Yoshiiku and Yoshitoshi as well as essays in both Japanese and English.
https://page.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/h1137198177
Expensive (and will cost a fortune to ship as it's massive) but worth it to the connoisseur, especially at today's exchange rates!

 

[flowersofnight]

カネコヂル (kanekodiru) 2, 1/2001
カネコヂル (kanekodiru) 3, 5/2001
カネコヂル (kanekodiru) 6, 6/2002

Getting these all out of the way at once since there's nothing remarkable in any of them - to me anyway. Fans of Metronome or Kishidan will find some interviews and live reportage with photographs. Issue 6 has an interesting bit from an uninteresting bandman about how CD royalties work in Japan, which I translated in a separate thread.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kanekodiru2.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kanekodiru2_150dpi.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kanekodiru3.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kanekodiru3_150dpi.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kanekodiru6.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/kanekodiru6_150dpi.pdf

Next, going back and filling a few holes in the G&SJ series, we're hopping back to June 1935.
June 1935's Gilbert and Sullivan Journal features:
- Notes on the D'Oyly Carte's American tour at the time ("The Gondoliers" in Montreal)
- A rather disapproving review of a rival commercial publication, "The American Gilbert and Sullivan Quarterly"
- "Lost" lyrics and songs from "The Mountebanks" - some but not all of which seem to have been unlost by the time the Lyric Theater Company made their recording a few decades later.
- Speculation on the circumstances when the "ghost song" from "Ruddigore" was written. Apparently there was a theory that Sullivan originally intended the song for some more serious opus.
- A review of Hesketh Pearson's biography of Gilbert and Sullivan - at the time the first book to chronicle them together as partners.
- Contemporary criticism of the later operas from "Punch" magazine - mostly negative! The critic apparently thought George Grossmith's talent lay entirely in his legs But we'll never know because unlike his Savoy contemporaries he never seems to have been recorded.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jun35.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_jun35_150dpi.pdf

 

[flowersofnight]

Après Guerre Vol. 15 (7/1996)

This is pretty much exactly what it says on the cover: a "Kansai Band Catalogue" with mini-profiles on all the bands listed, plus messages from various bands to the magazine staff on this, the occasion of their third anniversary. There are (small, blurry) pictures of every Apres Guerre cover up to this point. Most of these can be found online in better quality now from old auctions if nothing else, but #2 hasn't been seen before I think.
"SER/VICE" is actually the same as "Diana" from the famous Image Sonic omnibus.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre15.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre15_150dpi.pdf


Continuing with 1935's quarterly updates from Covent Garden, we reach September.
September 1935's Gilbert and Sullivan Journal features:

- Popularity rankings of the operas, one from the Melbourne Argus in spring 1935, and one from London's Sunday Times in autumn 1926.

Rank	Argus, 1935	Sunday Times, 1926
1	The Yeomen of the Guard	The Mikado
2	The Mikado	The Gondoliers
3	The Gondoliers	The Yeomen of the Guard
4	Iolanthe	Iolanthe
5	Patience	Patience
6	Ruddigore	H.M.S. Pinafore
7	The Pirates of Penzance	The Pirates of Penzance
8	H.M.S. Pinafore	Ruddigore
9	Princess Ida	Princess Ida
10	The Sorcerer	Trial by Jury
11	Utopia Limited	The Sorcerer
12	Trial by Jury
13	The Grand Duke

Recall that in the current year (and for some decades) the "Big Three" are "The Mikado", "Pirates of Penzance", and "HMS Pinafore", with all the rest being virtually unknown.

- The winning entries from an essay contest are in - the editors find one winning author, Barbara E. Davies, to possess a certain "charming feminine illogicality"
- Notes in various places on the "lonely member problem". Even in the heyday of joining up and socializing in clubs, it seems new members often felt isolated and shy.
- A reader bristles at the prospect of the D'Oyly Carte (supposedly) being on tour in America during the centenary of Gilbert's birth. (I don't know if this rumor was true)
- That illogical female calls out lazy members:

But when activity was needed they were laziness personified. I know from experience that the thrill of singing good choruses is well worth any trouble taken to learn them, but at the opening social few even tra-la-d with conviction. Then at all the functions there were such noticeable cliques that any lonely newcomer hoping to join in discussions and hearty choruses, could only slink silently to a side table, where he spent the evening moodily stirring his coffee, afraid to emit even a faint squeak.

You hear that, you bums? Get to your tra-la-ing!
- A glossary for "Pirates of Penzance"
- Some personal reminiscences about Gilbert from one Mrs. Alec-Tweedie.
- Debate on whether a certain performance of "The Gondoliers" on June 29 1935 was too much of a break from tradition. There's always been a certain mythos about the D'Oyly Carte and how it supposedly preserved the operas just as they were performed under Sir William's direction, but this is known not to be true and even in 1935 it was considered an "officially exploded theory" that it ought to have been.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_sep35.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_sep35_150dpi.pdf

 

[Cantavanda]

Thanks so much for your scans of Après Guerre vol. 6, big fan of Voluptuous and amazing to see pics in such HQ of them. Also own quite some tapes of other bands featured on there like D=SIRE, THE 6-TEENS, ZEDEKIAH, ROUAGE...
I got Après Guerre vol. 5 btw! I'll scan it and add it here
I also have every single Imperfection magazine except vol. 8 and will scan them later this summer holidays.
This year was a total nightmare: Half of it in hospital, and other half rushing to finish my master's degree classical composition in 4 months instead of a full year
I got the degree, played 3 concerts with my orchestra, got everything recorded, and even released a single collection as a "visual multipop" singer too.

Well, that's enough life updates, and now I can finally finally spend some time with my VK collection, rip and scan a ton of stuff. I can't wait to share stuff here!
I want to make a thread on how to recognise a real MALICE MIZER SADNESS demo tape, as I own TWO real ones now! Still looking every day for 10 years already for a real THE 1TH ANNIVERSARY, unsuccessfully
And never seen a real SANS LOGIQUE for sale. I'm keeping secret how it actually looks as I wanna be the one buying the real one when it comes on sale one day LOL. (I got a photo and rip of a Japanese collector, and a real SANS LOGIQUE sounds crisp by the way! New info ) Not allowed to share it, even if you pay me 100USD so no begging please... but just fun to know that a real SANS LOGIQUE sounds way crisper and cleaner than even the best remaster based on fake demo tapes.

My scans are in 600dpi tho

 

[flowersofnight]

My scans are in 600dpi tho

But what good is it if the magazines weren't printed in 600dpi in the first place?
Even the 300dpi ones I put up are huge overkill for most of these. (The Gilbert and Sullivan Journals - at least the earlier ones - were set in actual metal type so the resolution is "infinite" but even so there's not much point to zooming in with a microscope)

I got Après Guerre vol. 5 btw! I'll scan it and add it here

I'll be curious to see this - #5 and previous seem to be in the range of "for real oldschool crusaders only" so I never picked any up.
Those missing Imperfections will be very welcome - I believe there's a bunch of Malice Mizer-related stuff in the ones I don't have. Apart from #1 of course XD

 

[Cantavanda]

Oh yeah they're oldschool!!!

Listen to this one, it's Voluptuous, featured in most of the earliest Après Guerre ones.
Amazing band. Just uploaded it (wanted to do this one a while already)
I'd say "you should try to get into the entire VK scene of 1990-1995, like, all bands", but then your wallet will bleed out!
You already own so many magazines so that's a good part of the collection you have

 

[flowersofnight]

Listen to this one, it's Voluptuous, featured in most of the earliest Après Guerre ones.

This sounds like they were grasping toward some interesting ideas but perhaps were just too early (too old-school?) to amount to anything. It was all right but just didn't grab me. But thanks for uploading, as I was curious XD

Next up:



Après Guerre Vol. 18 (1/1997)

Opening with a highly symbolic piece about a man with a toilet brush that I'm too lazy to decipher, par ma chandelle verte.
Bands as featured on the cover; probably the most interesting bit from a modern standpoint is the photoreportage on La:Sadie's - as usual.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre18.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/apresguerre18_150dpi.pdf

Moving on: Finishing up with the 1930s (again) for now, we have December 1935's Gilbert and Sullivan Journal.

https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_dec35.pdf
https://www.prideofmind.com/data/gsj_dec35_150dpi.pdf

Following up on some themes from September's issue, we open with a bit of American/British sniping that turns into a debate on the nature of the Savoy tradition. I'll reproduce this long excerpt here in full for passers-by:

One of our American readers considers that the Journal is rather hard upon many trans-Atlantic productions, merely because they do not come up to the same standards of adherence to the traditional style as do the D'Oyly Carte performances. Linked up with this contention, our correspondent implies that the society, through its official organ, goes out of its way to champion that company at the expense of any other organization presenting the operas. In this letter, which was dealt with by direct reply, Mr. Henry Williams of Hanover, New Hampshire, writes: "One month the Journal comes out strongly for tradition; the next issue it defends some new departure concocted by the D'Oyly Carte management. In the United States, from 1925 to 1928, the Winthrop Ames company presented a series of revivals. These were ripped up by tradition lovers here and from abroad, yet no smoother or fonder productions have ever been presented. The deviations from the original texts in the Ames productions compared with some of the cuttings and re-arrangings of the D'Oyly Carte company were extremely slight."

Both these points may be answered together, and really the first raises a contention on which it is very necessary to avoid any misunderstanding. The D'Oyly Carte company is really nothing to us; but, as the articulate expression of Gilbert and Sullivan Opera, its existence cannot be ignored. It has often been written that the society is concerned with Gilbert and Sullivan Opera as a whole, and not with contemporary personalities engaged in its presentation. Yet, try as one may, the two things - the operas and the company - cannot be separated. The society, and by implication its official printed voice, is pledged to maintain intact the best traditions of the old Savoy. With the best intentions in the world, then, we cannot agree that it is at all possible to speak of the Winthrop Ames productions with those of the D'Oyly Carte company. After all, if we approve innovations by the latter organisationm we do at least know that they are made by the direct descendants of the original interpreters; by people to whom Gilbert's intentions - and Sullivan's - are fully known; by people whom we can trust not to depart from these intentions. Textual changes are no criterion; many a published play differs materially from the acted version. There are, we know, many interpolations and alterations (approved in most cases by Gilbert) which appear in the D'Oyly Carte productions but are absent from any edition of the libretto.

But where the truest tradition is to be found is in the spirit of the performance. We do not call, say, an amateur production "traditional" merely because it is a photographic reproduction of the professional company. But we should certainly be justified in calling a performance traditional, although positions and costumes differed from those to which we are accustomed, if the producer and actors, by their understanding of parts, situations, etc., achieved that elusive atmosphere and intellectual quality which really make up the Savoy tradition. Therefore, even allowing that the Ames' productions were the "smoothest and fondest" of interpretations, we cannot accept them as traditional for several reasons. In the place of the simple, rather unsophisticated, production, planned by Gilbert, which serves so well to sharpen his wit, satire, and irony, and Sullivan's melody, Mr. Ames gave New York showy spectacles. In place of the unforced humour, allowing the points to find their own home without extraneous aid, Mr. Ames found it necessary to force the points home by exaggerated comic business. He introduced new characters, to suit a little manikin of a player in his company. This little individual hopped about the stage in The Pirates of Penzance, presenting rhyming dictionaries to all and sundry. He was made the focus of attention in more than one place as the Lord Chancellor's train-bearer, a supernumerary character whose sole entrance is actually for "artistic verisimilitude" and correctness of local colour, as it were. Also in Iolanthe, I have recollections of an additional fairy who continually ogled the audience. And at the end of the opera, one did indeed have a glimpse of the realisation of the line "up in the air, sky high, sky high."

Now Gilbert would have had nothing of this; his humour is not too subtle, but even if it were, there would be no need to stress the fact by introducing it by way of the obvious. I can only refer these people who think that true Gilbert and Sullivan Opera can be achieved without recourse to the third necessary ingredient - the orthodox style of production as built up by the author to be as much a part of his book as the actual lines of the libretto - I can only, I repeat, refer such people to what I wrote in "Ourselves and the Operas" in March, 1933 (Vol. III, No. 9, p. 129). Here I asked readers to visualise a reversal of the position, instancing Mr. C. B. Cochran producing, in London, an American piece for which the original production accorded to a definite tradition. The use of Mr. Cochran's name in that connection must be evidence that one is not attacking Messrs. Ames, Aborn, and Co. as producers.

It all comes back to the D'Oyly Carte company for whom, as has been stressed, we are not official "boosters". Here is the one organisation that continues to present the operas in the manner in which they were conceived; a manner which, it has been proved, is on that brings out all that is best in the operas. That fact has long been realised in this country, and is speedily being recognised overseas.

To quote Sir Roderic, "These arguments sound very well, but I can't help thinking that, if they were reduced to syllogistic form, they wouldn't hold water." At one moment they're talking about "the orthodox style of production as built up by the author", and at the next about how it's fine for successors to pick up the torch and keep modifying the tradition. And they start off by accusing the New Yorkers of being textual nitpickers, but then condemn them for their stage antics. The two are orthogonal, strictly speaking, but shouldn't chopping up the text (as the D'Oyly Carte stood accused of) be just as bad as turning the staging into a farce (as Ames supposedly did)?
All of which is rather hard to tell at 99 years' distance. I wonder if any photos of the Ames productions survive.

Other interesting bits:
- More correspondence and articles from biographer Hesketh Pearson. He describes some of the difficulties with even (supposed) firsthand accounts when writing biography. Also, it seems Bernard Shaw advised him against writing the book, saying it was better left to a musician! Surprising from a wordsmith, especially one who did seem to have some regard for Sir William.
- A glossary for "Patience" (minus some of the aesthetes' cant)
- A letter from the posh seaside town of Hayama, Japan, comparing the local kabuki plays to "The Mikado"
- A disapproving review of an American book on the operas
- NEATER BADGES for sale - half the size of the originals, because people thought the old ones were too conspicuous!

Next time: another one-off unique publication before we get back to magazines!