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The Gilbert & Sullivan Very Light Opera Company Appearance at the Minnesota State Fair 2025

August 31, and September 1, 2025

The Gilbert & Sullivan Very Light Opera Company performed for a fourth time at the Minnesota State Fair, in its Arts A’Fair series. As in the previous three years, company members performed eight short sets, four sets each of the two days, in the round performance space at West End Market, with shops, food, and drink stands all around, and appreciative fairgoers stopping to sit on nearby benches and to listen. The weather was warm, sunny, and in the mid-80s.

Accompanied by Jean Orbison van Heel, twenty-three company members performed a variety of “Gilbert and Sullivan’s greatest hits” including, “Three Little Maids,” “Where You Not to Ko-Ko Plighted,” and “So Please You, Sir” from The Mikado, “I Am the Captain of the Pinafore,” from H.M.S. Pinafore, “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General,” from The Pirates of Penzance, The “Matter Patter” from Ruddigore, and “Then One of Us Will Be a Queen,” from The Gondoliers.

Waldyn Benbenek organized the event and served as Master of Ceremonies during the performances, including promoting the company’s upcoming productions of Iolanthe in the fall and The Yeomen of the Guard in the spring.

As in 2024, the performers ended each set with “Now to the Banquet We Press,” from The Sorcerer, with the lyrics revised by Maureen and Tom Berg to be a tribute to State-Fair food:

Now to the food at the fair
Now for the beer batter brats
Now for the lobster eclair
Now for the dill pickle tots

Now to whatever you pick
Now for the sweet cookie jar
The corn or the cheese on a stick
And now for the fried candy bar
The corn or the cheese on a stick
And now for the fried candy bar!

The beer batter brats and the dill pickle tots
The sweet cookie jar and the fried candy bar
The beer batter brats and the dill pickle tots
The sweet cookie jar and the fried candy bar

The beer batter brats and the dill pickle tots and the fried candy bar!
The fried candy bar and the sweet cookie jar and the dill pickle tots!
Tots! (Bar!) Tots! (Bar!)
Oh the dill pickle, dill pickle tots!
Bar! (Tots!) Bar! (Tots!)
Oh the fried candy, fried candy bar!

Participants

Robert Banks, Waldyn Benbenek, Maggie Benham, Tom Berg, Kelly Danger, Therese Drexler, Natalie Dulka, Alexander Gerchak, Maya Gitch, Scott A. Gorman, Mary Gregory, Ella Rose Katzenberger, Mary Kettlewell, Therese Kulas, Anna Maher, Mallory Rabehl, Seth Tychon Steidl, Mike Tober, Alessio Tranchell, Lara Trujillo, Sam Vinitsky, Natalie Wishcop, Josh Zapata-Palmer