Merrie England (opera)


Merrie England is an English comic opera in two acts by Edward German to a libretto by Basil Hood. The patriotic story concerns love and rivalries at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, when a love letter sent by Sir Walter Raleigh to one of Queen Elizabeth's Ladies in Waiting, Bessie Throckmorton, ends up in the hands of the Queen. Well-known songs from the opera include "O Peaceful England", "The Yeomen of England" and "Dan Cupid hath a Garden".
It opened at the Savoy Theatre in London on 2 April 1902, under the management of William Greet, and ran for 120 performances, closing on 30 July 1902. The piece then toured while the Kitty Loftus Company played at the Savoy. The production reopened at the Savoy on 24 November 1902 for 56 additional performances, ending on 17 January 1903. It starred Henry Lytton, Louie Pounds, Rosina Brandram, Robert Evett and Walter Passmore, among other regulars of the Savoy.
The opera became popular in Britain and was often performed by amateur groups in the decades following its premiere. In Queen Elizabeth II's coronation year, over five hundred amateur societies staged the piece. One production that year was presented as a coronation pageant outdoors at Luton Hoo house, with nearly 1,000 performers. The cast included Anne Ziegler as Bessie Throckmorton, Webster Booth as Walter Raleigh, Nancy Evans as Queen Elizabeth and Graham Clifford as Walter Wilkins.
Merrie England was recorded complete with its composer conducting, issued by HMV in 1918 on ten double-faced 12-inch 78 rpm records. A recording of selections from the piece was made in 1931 on the Columbia label, with Clarence Raybould conducting "Under the Supervision" of the composer. Since then a few more complete recordings have been made, including an HMV set in 1960, and individual songs from Merrie England have been recorded many times.
Despite its lively and accessible music and libretto, the piece has fallen into relative obscurity in recent decades, although anniversaries such as that of the Armada in 1988 and the Queen's silver, golden and diamond jubilee years have seen many revivals. Opera South produced a revival in February 2012. Professional revivals in 2012, the year of the Queen's diamond jubilee, included a production by the Finborough Theatre in London.

Background

Basil Hood's libretto makes heavy use of wordplay for comic effect. For example, the homophones 'fore' and 'four' are used in a scene in the second act where it is explained that a dragon has "four legs, two of which are hind legs and two of which are fore legs".
The poem in Act One giving the A to Z of Romeo and Juliet is a particularly fine example of Hood's writing, summarising the plot of Romeo and Juliet through use of the alphabet. The plot, a rustic, romanticised Tudor story, has been criticised for containing too many unimportant characters and for historical inaccuracy. It concerns love and rivalries at the court of Queen Elizabeth I, who is portrayed as jealous of Sir Walter Raleigh's affection for her Lady in Waiting, Bessie Throckmorton. This relationship is revealed to the Queen by the Earl of Essex, who transmits a love letter written by Raleigh to Throckmorton, which the Queen initially assumes was meant for herself. Ultimately, however, the Queen chooses Essex as her lover and forgives Throckmorton.
The music is an example of the style of English light opera made famous in the 1870s and 1880s by Gilbert and Sullivan. It features a prominent chorus and a range of principal numbers including ballads, patter songs, duets and quintets. German had gained a lot of practical knowledge about style and orchestration from completing Arthur Sullivan's score for The Emerald Isle, and he put this into practice in Merrie England, which was his own first large-scale work for the stage. German's engaging score, evoking the colourful Tudor period, combines pomp and ceremony with ballads and romantic arias. It includes the well known song for the Queen "O peaceful England" and the stirring "Yeomen of England", which became a favourite and was performed at Queen Elizabeth II's Jubilee celebrations in 2002.

Roles

Synopsis

Two versions of the plot exist: Hood's original from 1902 and a revised one by Dennis Arundell presented at Sadler's Wells in 1960. The opera is set in Windsor Town and makes frequent reference to mythology and folklore.

Act One

During the May Day festival, the May Queen is crowned with "roses white and roses red... the flowers of Merrie England". Her two guards are introduced – Long Tom and Big Ben – who are brothers identical in all but one thing. The "little difference between them" is that Big Ben loves the May Queen, while Long Tom loves Jill. Jill is accused of being a witch by the jealous May Queen and is shunned by the townsfolk.
Bessie Throckmorton, one of Queen Elizabeth's Ladies in Waiting, and Sir Walter Raleigh are in love, but they must keep their love a secret as the Queen is also in love with Raleigh. Bessie tells of how she carelessly lost a love letter from Raleigh. She worries that the letter may have fallen into Queen Elizabeth's hands and thus reveal their secret love. The Earl of Essex is handed the love letter by Jill-All-Alone and plans to use it to dispose of Raleigh. Walter Wilkins, a travelling actor, appears and argues that any play can be vastly improved by the addition of song and claims that "that's where and Shakespeare disagree."
Queen Elizabeth enters with much ceremony. Long Tom pleads for the Queen's protection of Jill-All-Alone from the townsfolk's persecution. The Queen asks Jill whether she believes she is a witch. Jill replies with the paradox that if she were a witch, she would know more than the townfolk. Therefore, she cannot be a witch, as she would know that she is a witch if she were. She declares that love will pass the Queen by. This insult angers the Queen, who joins with the villagers in condemning Jill as a witch, locking her away in Windsor Castle to be burned for witchcraft. Essex hands the Queen Raleigh's love letter, which she initially mistakes to be meant for her. Raleigh gallantly admits that the letter is in fact meant for Bessie Throckmorton. The Queen is so incensed that she banishes Raleigh from Court and imprisons Bessie in Windsor Castle.

Act Two

Jill has managed to escape with Bessie, using a secret passage out of the castle. The Queen asks an apothecary to concoct a poison which she will administer to Bessie. Wilkins works at length on a stage version of the story of St. George and the Dragon, and the play is performed for the Queen and Essex. Unfortunately, they dislike the play.
Eventually the Queen is persuaded to allow Raleigh and Bessie to love each other freely, choosing Essex instead for herself after seeing an apparition of Herne the Hunter, who, according to legend, appears only when a sovereign contemplates a crime. The whole court takes part in a reenactment of Robin Hood's wedding to Maid Marian. Everyone takes roles closely related to their part in the opera; for example, Raleigh becomes Robin to Bessie's Marian.

Musical numbers