“Tower warders, under orders,
Gallant pikemen, valiant sworders!
Brave in bearing, foemen scaring,
In their bygone days of daring!
Ne’er a stranger there to danger,
Each was o’er the world a ranger;
To the story of our glory
Each a bold, a bold contributory!”

—The Townspeople
The Yeoman of the Guard

Future Shows

See the On Stage page for the Spring 2012 production:
      Patience (March 9 through April 1, 2012)

 

The Yeomen of the Guard, Spring 2013

 

The Gilbert & Sullivan Very Light Opera Company is pleased to announce that it will present The Yeomen of the Guard, for four weekends, from March 1st through March 24th of 2013.

The performances will be at the Howard Conn Fine Arts Center, at Plymouth Congregational Church, located at 1900 Nicollet Avenue South, in Minneapolis.

This production of The Yeomen of the Guard will be directed by Lesley Hendrickson, with Music Direction by Marina Liadova.

The Yeomen of the Guard is set in the Tower of London during the reign of King Henry VIII.  The plot concerns Colonel Fairfax, a gentleman, soldier and scientist, who has been sentenced to be beheaded in an hour on a false charge of sorcery.  To avoid leaving his estate to his accuser, and with the help of the Lieutenant of the Tower, Fairfax secretly marries Elsie Maynard, a strolling singer.  The bride agrees to be blindfolded during the ceremony and expects to be a well-paid widow in an hour.  With the help of the Meryll family, Fairfax escapes, throwing the Tower into confusion and the astonished Elsie and Jack Point, a jester who loves her, into despair.  But Fairfax, disguised as Leonard Meryll, woos Elsie, and after a number of plot complications are worked out, she unknowingly falls in love with her husband, but leaves Jack Point broken-hearted.

The Yeomen of the Guard has been described as Gilbert and Sullivan’s most emotionally engaging operetta, more serious in character, with none of Gilbert’s typical satire of British institutions.  While the libretto does contain considerable humor, Gilbert’s trademark satire and topsy-turvy plot complications are subdued in comparison with the other Gilbert and Sullivan operas.  Musically, the operetta is considered to be one of Sullivan’s finest works, as well as the most musically ambitious of the Gilbert and Sullivan canon.

If you would like to be notified about when to order tickets, we invite you to add your name to our mailing list.  This way, we will know how to contact of you!  We never sell our mailing list to other parties.

“I have a song to sing, O!”

“What is your song, O!”

“It is sung with the ring of the songs maids sing
Who love with a love life-long, O!
It’s the song of a merrymaid, nestling near,
Who loved her lord – but dropped a tear
At the moan of the merryman, moping mum,
Whose soul was sad, and whose glance was glum,
Who sipped no sup, and who craved no crumb,
As he sighed for the love of a ladye!”

—Elsie Maynard and the Full Company
The Yeomen of the Guard