THE DANCING YEARS – Various Artists (Jay Records – CDJAY2 1452)
Star rating: five stars ★ ★ ★ ★ ★
The Marmite of operetta Ivor Novello – you either love him or loathe him – wrote The Dancing Years back in 1939.
The story takes place in Vienna, from 1911 until 1938 and follows the life of a penniless Jewish composer and his love for two women of different social classes, set against the background of Nazi persecution.
The musical was first produced at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane on 23 March 1939, directed by Novello’s frequent collaborator Leontine Sagan. Novello, a Welsh heartthrob, usually starred in his own productions, this time was no exception and it was opposite Mary Ellis. It closed at the start of the Second World War in September 1939 after 187 performances. After a three-year provincial tour, the show reopened at the Adelphi Theatre on 14 March 1942, running there until July 1944, for a total of 969 performances. It was the most popular show of the war and earned an estimated £1,000,000 (£46,000,000 in today’s money). Lots of theatrical producers would sell their mothers for that sort of profit today!
So why the Marmite reference? Well, some think that he is overly romantic, the plot-lines are so far-fetched as to become ridiculous and the shows were way too long. Whilst others won’t have a word said against him – he is a product of his age and many of his songs have survived into the modern theatre songbook. ‘We’ll Gather Lilacs’, ‘Waltz of my Heart’, ‘Keep the Home Fires Burning’, ‘Primrose’, ‘If This Were Love’, ‘Rose of England’ to name a few.
The Dancing Years has hints of Noel Coward’s Bitter Sweet, which Novello found ‘…sheer joy from beginning to end’. His other shows from the same period were Glamorous Nights, Careless Rapture and Crest of the Wave – but The Dancing Years outdid them all and soon became a classic of the genre.
In order to present Novello these days you need top-knot talent and Jay Records hasn’t stinted on that front. Recorded over the years, at the iconic Abbey Road Studios and Angel Studios, London, the cast is:
Maria Ziegler/Lorelei: Valerie Masterson
Cåcilie/Countess/Madame Kurt: Louise Winter
Rudi Kleber/Signor Ceruti: David Fieldsend
Grete: Katrina Murphy
Madame Pelotti: Mary Hegarty
Madame Sadun: Tinuke Olafimihan
Signor Valdo: Lynton Black
The Night Watchman: Scott Leiendecker
The Narrator: Janie Dee
The Original orchestrations are sumptuously played by the National Symphony Orchestra conducted by John Owen Edwards and Craig Barna.
In order to give some semblance of what is going on between each song, waltz, masque, etc we have a narration which is written by none other than the master of musical comedy from its beginnings until today – Kurt Gänzl, who has also written the booklet notes – always interesting.
This is the complete operetta with music not even heard on a recording since the original production at Drury Lane. Also, as far as I am concerned: anything with Valerie Masterson in it is worth the purchase price alone!
Nick Wakeham
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