About the Show
“The Pirates of Penzance” was the fifth collaboration between W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan. Gilbert and Sullivan decided to present official versions of “The Pirates of Penzance” simultaneously in England and America. The opera premiered on December 31, 1879 at the Fifth Avenue Theater in New York with Sullivan conducting, but a single performance had been given on the previous day at the Royal Bijou Theatre, Paignton, England, to secure the British copyright. Finally, the opera opened on April 3, 1880, at the Opéra Comique in London, where it ran for 363 performances, having already been playing successfully for over three months in New York. Gilbert, the duo's librettist, was an accomplished satirist known for a series of illustrated verses written under the pen name Bab. Sullivan, the composer, was often called the “English Mendelssohn,” but his genius was most evident in the lighter comic songs he wrote with Gilbert. Sullivan's solo works include the opera Ivanhoe and the hymn “Onward Christian Soldiers.” Gilbert and Sullivan's operas were wildly popular in their time and are still performed worldwide today.
For more information about the show, and Gilbert and Sullivan in general, please visit this site.
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