TRIAL BY JURY by GILBERT & SULLIVAN

This delightful work – a perfect little one act comic opera - was the product of a very early collaboration between Gilbert & Sullivan. Gilbert was a barrister by

profession and so understood exactly the “legal” aspects of a “Breach of Promise of Marriage” trial. But in this case, the trial goes awry, in the process spoofing the law, lawyers and the legal system.

The music is light and easy on the ear and includes some clever parodies – for example, a grand Handel-like Oratorio fugal chorus, and a beautiful, typical Italian opera-type ensemble, rather like the famous sextet in Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor. Sullivan was a skilled “serious” composer, schooled in the German composing tradition. But he also had the ability to apply the lightest and most frivolous music to many of Gilberts light-hearted and comic lyrics, creating the perfect marriage between words and music.