Chris Webber replies to me:

>>I can't imagine Glyndebourne reviving the operettas, as the festival
>>did (and EMI published in what remain for me the best recordings) in
>>the Fifties.
>
>I'm open to happy correction, but I can't recall that Glyndebourne ever
>staged any of the Savoy operas.  The recordings (under Sargent) were made
>with the Glyndebourne Chorus of the day, but I think that was about the sum
>of it.

I stand corrected.  I was going on dim memories of liner notes.

>The Sargent/EMI 'Glyndbourne' sets of Gilbert and Sullivan ...  have
>always provoked a mixed reaction.  It's perhaps fair to say that in both
>cases musical values were high, whilst theatrical ones were left to fend
>for themselves.
>
>same period - let alone the classic accounts (some conducted by Sargent
>himself) from the 1920's and 30's.

Just finished listening to the Sargent Mikado.  Wonderful.  On the other
hand, I would agree with Chris's judgment of Sargent's Pinafore.  I would
never call the Godfrey/D'Oyly Carte recordings lively or sparkling.  To me,
it was music-making in tones of brown, as drab as the last days of the
theater itself.

Steve Schwartz