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Music Text

Libretto by the composer and Christopher Hassall after Richard Brinsley Sheridan's comedy (E,G). Performing Edition (1991) by David Drew.

Scoring

Major roles: S,2M,2T,2Bar,B; small roles: T,B,3speakers;
chorus; dancers
2.picc.2.corA.2.bcl.2-4.2.2.euph.1-timp.perc(3):xyl/cast/rattle/
3Chin.tom-t/Korean tpl.bl/tamb/SD/BD/cyms/2susp.cyms/tam-t-
cel-harp-strings

Abbreviations (PDF)

Opera
For full details on this stagework, including synopsis and roles, please visit our Opera section.
Publisher

Boosey & Hawkes

Territory
This work is available from Boosey & Hawkes for the world.

Availability

World stage premiere
1/21/1992
Teatro Lirico Nacional, Madrid
Felicity Palmer, David Rendall, Anthony Michaels-Moore, Richard van Allan, Dir: Jose-Carlos Plaza / Madrid Opera / Antoni Ros Marba
Repertoire Note

As an operatic project, The Duenna provided Gerhard with the perfect combination of an English play on a Spanish subject, reuniting the split cultural aspects of his life. He was drawn by Sheridan's sparkling, comic dialogue, but also by the Seville setting with "its colour and atmosphere, its social climate; wealth and fashion rubbing elbows with beggars, gypsies and picaresque rogues". Gerhard's only opera was a labour of love in straitened circumstances, uncommissioned with little hope of staging, but it achieved a radio concert performance in 1949 with a cast including Peter Pears. The Duenna was finally acclaimed on the stage in 1992, more than 20 years after Gerhard's death, thanks to the performing edition by David Drew, with a production shared between the Teatro Lirico Nacional in Madrid, the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona and Opera North in Leeds.

Subjects
Recommended Recording
cd_cover

Claire Powell/Neill Archer/Richard van Allan/Adrian Clarke/Eric Roberts/Susannah Glanville/Opera North/English Northern Philharmonia/Antoni Ros Marbà
Chandos CHAN 9520

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Links

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