Word: patters
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...really, it is uncanny how the terminology used to distinguish the different jazz styles today resembles the practiced patter of a used-clothes saleswomen. "Contemporary" replies the hey-man at the other end of the telephone when you ask what the well-noised jazz-listener will be hearing tomorrow. Contemporary? What's contemporary? The voice will reply--sounding laid-back of course--"Like, uh, sort of late 50's and early 60's--it was too advanced for them then so they didn't appreciate...
...very little dialogue; there's nothing here, for instance, to rival the verbal pyrotechnics between the two peers in Iolanthe or the pompous flatulence of Poo-Bah in The Mikado. Pirates' fame derives rather from its score, which is a typical G&S mix of rousing chorus numbers, patter songs and take-offs on Italian grand opera...
...what to do with all that talent. Seltzer's version of Pirates boasts plenty of directorial business: There are the banners proclaiming "Death and Slaughter" and "Glory and the Grave," unfurled as the policemen prepare to combat the pirates; the purposeful delay in starting Major General Stanley's famous patter song ("I am the very model of a modern Major General"); the instantaneous characterization of the last policeman as a bumbler out of step with the rest. But more impressive is Seltzer's general handling of the cast--not only the leads, most of whom could do this sort...
Dennis Crowley, back once again to sing the patter song, is another familiar face. Crowley has somewhat less to do as Major General Stanley than he did as the Lord Chancellor in Iolanthe, but he carries the part off with the same Gilbertian quizzicality that has marked his previous successes. His rendering of the difficult patter song is excellent, with every word--well, just about every word--clearly audible...
There are G&S aficionados who delight in humming Sullivan's airs and are apt to break into a patter song at a moment's notice, or without it. Then there are those whose exposure to the masters of Victorian operetta has been painfully shoddy. The current G&S production of The Pirates of Penzance is bound to convince both groups that it is, it is after all a glorious thing to be a Gilbert and Sullivan...