THE YEOMEN OF THE GUARD

 

 

 

Gilbert said that the inspiration for The Yeomen of the Guard came to him one morning while he was waiting for a train at Uxbridge Station.   He saw a poster of the Tower Furnishing Company advertising furnishings, and it featured a beefeater and the Tower of

London.   He thought that the beefeater would be a good figure and the Tower a good setting for the next opera.    For the title of the opera, The Tower of London was thought

of first.   That was changed to The Tower Warders, and then to The Beefeaters.    Finally it became The Yeomen of the Guard.    

 

 

 

At Sullivan’s home on Christmas Day 1887, when Gilbert, Sullivan and D’Oyly Carte

met, Gilbert read the plot he  proposed, Sullivan was immensely pleased with it.

 

 

Sullivan found difficulty in creating the setting for Jack Point’s number “I have a song to

sing, O!”, and had been working on the setting for some weeks.. He asked Gilbert

whether he had some old air in his mind which suggested the metre.   Gilbert hummed a

few bars of a sea shanty which the sailors on his yacht sang on Saturday evenings.  

Sullivan ran to the piano and composed the number in an hour.  

 

 

The Yeomen of the Guard opened on 3 October 1888 and ran for 423 performances. 

 

In The Yeomen of the Guard, Colonel Fairfax, a gentleman, gallant soldier and scientist,

has been condemned to die in an hour on a false charge as a sorcerer.   On his death,.his

estate will pass to his accuser, a cousin.   To avoid his estate passing to his accuser, Fairfax marries Elsie Maynard, a strolling singer.   Fairfax escapes.    A pardon for

Fairfax is received.   The unexpected happens throughout The Yeomen of the Guard .