AFTER THE BALL (BBC RADIO)
https://www.sendspace.com/file/oueuvb
https://www.sendspace.com/file/oueuvb
May 27th at the Peacock Theatre, London After the Ball by Noël Coward.
A concert performance of this unique musical based on Oscar Wilde’s Lady Windermere’s Fan.
First performance for over 40 years. BBC Concert Orchestra. John McGlinn conductor.
Noël believed that this was his best work, but was devastated by its debut performance in 1954 when much of the music had to be cut to accommodate the vocal limitations of the cast. This was the first ever performance of After the Ball in the musical version which Coward intended.
Starred: Rosie Ashe, Penelope Keith, Fiona Kimm, Linda Kitchen, Frances McCafferty, Marie McLaughlin, Karl Daymond, George Dvorsky, Tom McVeigh, Christopher Saunders. Staged by Paul Curran. Edited from the original version of the text with additional material by Barry Day.
Music sleuth revives Coward masterpiece by Louise Jury in The Independent on Sunday, 2nd. May, 1999, page 6.
"He was known as The Master and this was the work he regarded as his masterpiece. But it has taken almost half a century for After the Ball to be performed as Noël Coward wished. The quintessential English wit was devastated by the first performance of his musical in 1954, when much of the score was cut because the leading lady could not sing it. Now John McGlinn, an American conductor, has tracked down the score and pieced together missing parts for its first performance in 40 years, to take place during the Covent Garden Festival in London next month. Graham Payn, Noël Coward's companion and a star of the original production, is hoping to travel from his home in Switzerland for the revival."
This concert version of the Noel Coward musical based on Oscar Wilde's classic play premiered at the Covent Garden Festival and the Chicago Humanities Festival to honor Noel Coward in his Centenary Year. The young Lady Windermere discovers that her husband has been seeing Mrs. Erlynne, a fascinating older woman, so she determines to run away with her admirer, Lord Darlington. Her honor is saved when Mrs. Erlynne intervenes and, in the process, compromises herself in the eyes of Victorian society. Lady Windermer never learns that her savior is the mother she thought was dead. This period concert version restores Coward's original libretto, reinstates important cut songs and adds new linking material.
https://castalbums.org/recordings/After-the-Ball-1999-Concert-Cast/7450/