We’ve now released our second recording, Solomon and Burnand’s charming operetta Pickwick. We were delighted to have the extraordinary Simon Butteriss take the role of Pickwick, with Gaynor Keeble singing Mrs Bardell, and Toby Stafford-Allen, the Baker. Our pianist was the superb Stephen Higgins. The CD includes the wickedly amusing Cups and Saucers, by George Grossmith, Gilbert and Sullivan’s brilliant and gifted comic baritone. This was written as a curtain-raiser, to whet the audience’s appetite for what was to come, and was very highly acclaimed.

It is no exaggeration to describe Pickwick as the first great Charles Dickens musical, though in its own day it was categorised as an operetta (and, for the scholarly minded, was officially titled a ‘dramatic cantata,’ following the Gilbert and Sullivan Trial by Jury). Musical versions of Dickens’s stories before Pickwick were little more than disjointed spoken plays with a handful of largely incidental songs. Pickwick, by contrast, was essentially conceived in sung music from start to finish, the most celebrated incident in Pickwick Papers, the hilarious misunderstanding between Mr Pickwick and Mrs Bardell, elaborated in a series of sparkling songs and duets. Pickwick was premiered at the Comedy Theatre, London, on 7 February 1889, where it ran for several weeks, getting excellent reviews. It boasted a superb cast, with Arthur Cecil as Pickwick, Lottie Venne as Mrs Bardell and Rutland Barrington as the Baker. Barrington later recalled that Pickwick ‘used to go splendidly’ and that Solomon was ‘absolutely brimming over with melodies that caught the ear at once.’ But the Baker? Who was he? There is a clue in Pickwick Papers, but you’ll have to listen to the operetta to discover the full extent of his ‘roll’ in the fateful misunderstanding!

It is doubtful whether any Dickensian musical theatre work has ever been created with more practical experience of the stage: by 1889, Burnand had written some ninety theatrical works, while Solomon had composed over twenty theatrical scores. Burnand claimed, with good reason, to be the father of the English operetta. He collaborated with Arthur Sullivan several years before W. S. Gilbert did, writing the text of Cox and Box (1866) for him. Solomon, for his part, was regularly compared with Sullivan, so the Burnand and Solomon partnership, which also produced several other works, can be legitimately considered a sort of alternative Gilbert and Sullivan. Pickwick, for its part, was immediately recognised as a work in the Cox and Box vein, so altogether this delightful little musical may be said to connect two of the great pillars of nineteenth-century British culture: Charles Dickens and the Savoy operettas.

Edward Solomon was born in 1855 in London; he learned to play the piano from his father, a music hall pianist, conductor and composer.

He was an extremely busy musician, spotting opportunities, and composing where and when needed. He worked a good deal with Pot Stephens, producing a number of lightweight, popular theatre pieces, but worked with others too. Pickwick wasn’t the only piece he wrote with Burnand – they also wrote Domestic Economy and The Tiger, though this last one was not a success.

His first wife was 15 when they married (their daughter was born the same year), and he later married again, without going to the bother of divorcing his first wife. Once his second wife learned of the first, she divorced him; later so did his first wife, and he married a third time. He accumulated five wives in all, and several children.

Solomon packed a good deal into a short life – he died of typhoid fever in 1895, aged just 39. The Wikipedia article has much more to say about him.

Sir Francis Cowley Burnand – usually known simply as F. C. Burnand – was born in London in 1836. He was a prolific playwright, and a leading contributor to the magazine Punch. Even in his teens, he was involved in the theatre, and was a founder member of the Cambridge University Amateur Dramatic Club (which still exists today). His family pressured him into joining the priesthood, where he blotted his copybook by leaving the Anglican church, and converting to Catholicism. Fortunately, his father bowed to the inevitable and gave him his blessing to leave a religious life behind and go into the theatre.  The Wikipedia article on Burnand is extensive and useful.