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by Oscar Telgmann, directed by Guillermo Silva-Marin

Toronto Operetta Theatre, Jane Mallett Theatre, Toronto

February 19-21, 2010

To celebrate its 25th anniversary, Toronto Operetta Theatre (TOT), Canada’s only professional operetta company, revived Leo, the Royal Cadet by Oscar Telgmann (c. 1855-1946).  When the TOT first revived Leo in 2001, it was the first time in over seventy years that the work had been staged.  In its day Leo had been one of the most popular operettas ever written in Canada.  Between 1889, when in premiered in Kingston, Ontario, and 1925, it had racked up over 1,700 performances.  In 1925 a devastating flood destroyed all copies of the orchestral score.  In 1997 TOT General Director Guillermo Silva-Marin discovered a copy of the piano-vocal score in the National Library in Ottawa.  He and dramaturg Virginia Reh revised the libretto by brothers George F. and Charles Cameron from three acts to two.  After a close study of Telgmann’s other works, musicologist John Greer orchestrated the score for a band of thirteen, likely the forces Telgmann would have had when he toured Leo through Southern Ontario and upstate New York.          

The result is an absolutely charming operetta, well worth the efforts it took to resurrect it.  Telgmann and the Cameron brothers were clearly intent on creating a realistic and authentically Canadian work.  The setting is in and around the Royal Military College in Kingston (Canada’s West Point) from 1878-79 with a brief excursion to South Africa for the Battle of Isandlwana in 1879.  The Camerons eschew all the clichés of British and European operetta.  There is Gilbertian topsy-turveydom or aristocrats in disguise.  Instead, the story focuses Leo and his friend the poet Wind, whose running gag is his habit of copying down all romantic dialogue he hears for use in the “faery opera” he is writing.  This unusual character thus gives the piece a sense of self-awareness and satirizes the type of operetta, most likely Gilbert and Sullivan’s Iolanthe of 1882, to which Telgmann’s is opposed.  Commandant Hewett of the RCM sends Leo to South Africa because he has taken a fancy to Leo’s girlfriend Nelly.  The Camerons’ satire target Hewett’s pulling of rank, the infighting of the RCM’s French and German professors and the disdain of cadets by the town “dudes,” ignorant that the military’s sacrifices protect their lives.  As one might expect, Leo becomes a hero, Nelly proves true and all ends happily.  Silva-Marin and Reh expand the Camerons’ libretto with an actual performance of Wind’s opera made up of songs Telgmann wrote for other occasions.                  

Telgmann’s varied and unfailingly inventive score shows a strong influence of Sullivan but with less inclination toward Mendelssohnian romanticism and more towards the straightforwardness of American popular song.  As Leo, Cory O’Brien sang in a light velvety tenor, pure and firm even in its highest notes.  He delivered Leo’s good-bye song to Nelly and Canada, “Farewell, O Fragrant Pumpkin Pie” in a manner that summed up the work’s melding of gentle humor and sincerity.  As Nelly, soprano Kristin Galer had a strong, bright voice and clearly relished her many showpiece roulades.  Silva-Marin, also the stage director, recreated the work’s sense of innocence without ever letting it devolve into camp.  Conductor Jeffrey Huard brought out Telgmann’s crisp rhythms and maintained excellent balance between the strings and the brass.  The choral contributions, highlighted in two lovely a cappella choruses, were consistently impressive.  The original Leo was performed in the presence of the RMC Commandant and cadets.  This opening night played before the current commandant and two of Telgmann’s grandchildren.  Since the RMC had contributed to the costumes, authentic scarlet dress tunics could be seen both in the swathes of cadets in the audience as well as on stage.  Leo may not be a masterpiece, but it is an important, highly enjoyable work of Canadian music theatre that, judging from opening night, is still capable of evoking a rapturous response.    

©Christopher Hoile

Note: A version of this review appeared in Opera News 2010-05-01.

Photo: Kristin Galer, Jeremy Lapalme, Lise Maher, Cory O'Brien. ©Gilberto Prioste.