Princess Ida

Since I had previously enjoyed plays at Schwartz (all two of them), when a couple of my roommates* brought up going to see Princess Ida, I decided to go with them.  The event was part of Cornell’s School of Continuing Education’s summer series, in which performances, lectures, and concerts are offered (for free!) for six weeks in the summer.

Princess Ida is a Gilbert and Sullivan comic opera about a prince and a princess who have been pledged to be married to each other since childhood.  However, when it comes time to marry, the prince finds out that his bride to be is at a women’s college.  No men allowed, but he has to go get her, doesn’t he?

The group that performed Princess Ida, Savoyards Musical Theatre, had adapted the opera to be set in Western New York.  The fathers of the bride and groom are from Buffalo and Syracuse, and the women’s college is in Aurora (on Cayuga Lake).  I can imagine Princess Ida must have been at least mildly amusing** in its original form, but being set right where we were made it that much better.

Although it was longer than I was expecting, I thoroughly enjoyed the opera.  The plot and characters were somewhat ridiculous, but that’s what made it so funny.  The music was provided by a single pianist.  It was nothing too difficult, but that almost makes it worse, because you can hear all the mistakes.  If someone’s playing a seven note chord with thirty-second notes over it and he/she misses a note, no one’s going to be able to tell unless they have perfect pitch or know the piece very, very well.  If someone’s playing a relatively simple piece and hits the wrong accidental, everyone and their dog will hear it.  So props*** to the pianist, and to all the actors and actresses for a job well done and an entertaining evening.

Completely unrelated picture from the Plantations one evening.

*From here on out, I will be using the term roommate for anyone I share living quarters with – my apartment, suite, room, bed, the basement of Olin, etc.

**In its initial showings, Princess Ida was not very well received, and remains one of the lesser performed Gilbert and Sullivan operas today.

***All the puns intended.