[Dixielandjazz] Finding One's Niche

[Steve barbone]

Not OKOM, but a still a charming review of how one group of musicians and
actors maintain a niche. Interesting points therein include:

1) The show is backed by a 25 piece band. (rare these days on NYC stages)
2) It is amplified.
3) The context is updated.
4) The Times critic liked it.
5) The audience liked it.

Perhaps a near perfect combination of relevance, visual art, and musical art
that we OKOM band leaders might do well to emulate? After all, these Gilbert
& Sullivan Players succeed where others fail.

Cheers,
Steve 

Nanki-Poo, Yum-Yum and Other Eternal Verities
NY TIMES By BERNARD HOLLAND - January 12, 2006

Gilbert and Sullivan operas can be an enthusiasm, a hobby or in extreme
cases an obsession. How else to explain the 32 seasons of Albert Bergeret's
New York Gilbert & Sullivan Players? My 25 years on the beat have found them
in circumstances far more threadbare than City Center, where "The Mikado"
played on Tuesday night. Where similar companies in the city have faded, Mr.
Bergeret and his little team have persevered, and here they were with a very
decent 25-piece band, a legitimate stage and a nice audience for their
January season.

One hopes they won't completely lose that charming tinge of semi-amateur, ad
hoc and make-do, but this was pretty much a professional operation. Mr.
Bergeret is a competent conductor, and, goodness knows, he knows the music.
The sets and costumes are generic Anglo-Japanese. The cast ranges from good
to just passable. The amplification is brazen, but that, I am afraid, is
what we have come to. And then there is that loving audience which will
simply not let these operas go.

Mr. Bergeret - who directs and does a lot of other things too, I suspect -
favors jokey Gilbert and Sullivan. Nothing could be more apt than some of
his updates of the text, ranging from venal congressmen to amateur
competitions on television. I am less comfortable with the slangy asides
that take this parody of British life out of context and make fun of
something making fun of something else. The wisecracks tend to bleed away
the clever humor of the original. Mr. Bergeret and his loyalists would
disagree.

The Gilbert and Sullivan repertory is catnip to the stage addict with a
nimble tongue and a not-quite-operatic voice. The perceived invitations to
physical humor, mugging and slapstick are better resisted but rarely are -
certainly not here. Michael Scott Harris's light, sensitive tenor is right
for Nanki-Poo, and he preserves a certain dignity. Dianna Dollman's Katisha
is dark, powerful and legitimately operatic. Stephen Quint is the Ko-Ko:
light of foot and of voice and agreeably bent on scene-stealing. Louis
Dall'Ava's Pooh-Bah adopts a fake stomach, garish make-up and shameless
shtick. 

Keith Jurosko is the Mikado: imperial and confused in just the right mix. I
also liked Edward Prostak's bearing and steady voice as Pish-Tush. Jennifer
Piacenti's slight soprano as Yum-Yum made less of an effect, as did her
companion Maids From School, Melissa Attebury and Robin Bartunek. The chorus
was reasonably well prepared.

"H.M.S. Pinafore" and an evening of "Trial by Jury" and Gilbert and Sullivan
excerpts are joining "The Mikado" in a three-item series at City Center
running through Sunday. We shall laugh at the jokes and smile at the social
satire, but behind both are some extraordinary music and Arthur Sullivan's
talent for pushing irresistible melody into long, rushing sequences that
never lose their equilibrium. This is not superficial stuff.

"The Mikado" will be performed tomorrow at 8 p.m. and Saturday at 1 p.m.;
"H.M.S. Pinafore" Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m., and "Trial by
Jury" and a highlights revue tonight at 8, at City Center, 131 West 55th
Street, Manhattan; (212) 581-1212.