Gilbert & Sullivan
Sir William Gilbert (1836-1911)
Sir Arthur Sullivan (1842-1900)
Nationality: British
Major compositions: The Mikado, H.M.S. Pinafore, The Pirates of Penzance
Interesting Facts:
- Gilbert was an English humorist and Sullivan a composer; they wrote comic
operas together.
- They were not friends but by correspondence they collaborated for twenty
years on fourteen operettas.
- Gilbert was tall and married a woman named Lucy. They had no children
but many pets.
- Sullivan dated many glamorous women but never married. He loved
Shakespeare and fancy food.
- Gilbert and Sullivan last met when they took a bow together at their final
operetta. They came on stage from different directions and wouldn’t speak
to each other.
- The operettas made both men wealthy. Gilbert’s last house in the country
was staffed by forty servants surrounded by one hundred acres of farmland
and a private lake. He drove a Rolls-Royce. Sullivan lived in a luxurious
apartment near Westminster Abbey.
- The operettas Gilbert and Sullivan wrote poked fun at English government,
art, and fashions.
- Although Sullivan was the most successful serious English composer of his
time, his only work remembered now (aside from the operettas) is the
hymn Onward Christian Soldiers.
- Gilbert got the idea for The Mikado when, after a fight with Sullivan, he
was pacing in his study and a huge Japanese sword on the wall suddenly
crashed to the floor.
- In third grade at Ranney school students play Misasama from The Mikado on their
recorders.
