Talk:Cox and Box

"False Links" in Discography
The original editor of this page created a "link" to every name mentioned in the Discography, regardless of whether that person had a Wikipedia page or not. Many of those names are not really notable in the Wikipedia sense, and are unlikely to ever have articles of their own.

When I followed those links, in several cases they led to completely unrelated persons who were clearly not the artists the Discography referred to. In those cases, I removed the links, as I was not prepared to create new articles about these artists, and I didn't think disambiguation pages were justified. (They are not, as I have suggested, "notable" in the Wikipedia sense.)

I haven't found a Wikipedia policy or guideline that's on-point, but I think it's a mistake to routinely link every human being mentioned in an article. Only those that are truly notable &mdash; those who should have articles, if they don't already &mdash; should be linked.

Nevertheless, I have only "unlinked" those names that were clearly pointing to the wrong person, and I've let the others stand. Marc Shepherd 13:55, 5 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I found the relevant Wikipedia guideline on linking, which makes clear that one shouldn't link unless there is an existing relevant article, or the reasonable prospect that one should be created. I have therefore changed all the links to "non-notable" artists without articles to plain text. Marc Shepherd 22:37, 5 April 2006 (UTC)
 * The person responsible for the offending links was Tim riley, and not the original creator of the page as claimed by Marc Shepherd. A check of the History page for this article will easily confirm this.  Figaro 14:52, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
 * Shouldn't Adams and Round, at least, be linked? The are listed as major artists on the G&S page. --Ssilvers 21:05, 24 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I would link them only if there are articles. If someone ever writes a Round or Adams article, it would then be trivial to find mentions of them in Wikipedia. For now, they would just be red links. Marc Shepherd 12:48, 25 May 2006 (UTC)


 * On Wikipedia, if you link an article that has not been written yet, this alerts interested people to write the article, so maybe it would be useful, if we think that Round and Adams deserve WP entries.  They both had opera careers in addition to DOC, and they certainly appear on lots of recordings....   I'm inclined to think they deserve articles.  --Ssilvers 18:51, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Differences between play and opera
An earlier edit said:


 * Burnand's text follows Morton's original play closely, differing in only two notable respects. In the play it is Mrs - rather than Sergeant - Bouncer who lets the rooms; and before the receipt of Penelope Anne's letter announcing her engagement to Knox, Burnand omits the receipt of two other letters, the first reporting that Penelope Anne is presumed drowned, and the second that she has been rescued and is on her way to meet her fiancé.

The first part of this statement is true, but not the second. In Burnand and Sullivan's Cox and Box, all three letters appear. See the libretto on the G&S Archive. It's only in the 1920s Savoy Version that the first two letters are omitted.

The earlier edit placed this comment in the "Synopsis" section. After correcting the error, I moved it to the "History" section, where it more appropriately belongs. Marc Shepherd 17:26, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Category:Operas vs. categories Operas by Arthur Sullivan, English-language operas, etc.
Categories Operas by Arthur Sullivan, English-language operas, English comic operas and One-act operas are all categories or subcategories of Category:Operas. — Robert Greer (talk) 12:28, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

External links modified
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External links modified
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Bouncer as a "Counter-Tenor"
The article states that Sullivan originally wrote Bouncer as a Counter-Tenor part, but, whilst John Foster was certainly an Alto Lay Clerk at the Chapel Royal, the autograph score indicates clearly that, for the most part, he would have sung the part in his normal Baritone range, just like everybody who has played Bouncer since, except for a slightly higher setting of Bouncer's opening song, an unusually high note in the Recitative section of the "Stay Bouncer Stay" Duet and the likely indication that he was originally supposed to sing the top line in the Rataplan Trio. Whilst these elements were almost certainly put in by Sullivan to cater for Foster's abilities to sing in a higher range, I think it's misleading to actually state that Sullivan wrote the part for a "Counter-Tenor", a term that would have rarely been used in the 1860s and 70s and gives a false impression of how the part was originally scored.


 * This is a good point, and I completely agree, but I wish you had found a review or some scholarship that we could cite for the proposition that he sang it mostly in the Baritone range. -- Ssilvers (talk) 16:29, 14 September 2022 (UTC)

On the other hand, the idea that Foster sang the part as a Counter-Tenor or with any use of his higher register, except in the sections of the score that I mentioned, is supposition in itself and seems to be based purely on the fact that he sang Alto at the Chapel Royal. The male Alto voice in Victorian Britain was almost exclusively confined to church choirs and close harmony singing and, even though examples exist on early records, it was never really taken seriously again as a solo voice until Alfred Deller began his career in the 1940s. If Foster had sung the whole role up the octave in falsetto, reviewers WOULD have taken notice and passed comment, probably with a degree of shock and surprise, just as they did when Rutland Barrington, who was also known to sing Alto occasionally in a choral/singing group capacity, delivered part of the "Society Has Quite Forsaken" song in falsetto in the original run of "Utopia Limited".

As for citations, Peter Giles covers the subject of the rather limited opportunities available to Victorian male Alto singers in as much detail as he can in his comprehensive book on the history of high male voices, entitled "The Counter-Tenor" (Frederick Muller 1982), but unfortunately, I fear it is long out of print and I don't currently have access to my copy.

I realise that the lack of specific scholarship on the subject makes it difficult to prove either way exactly how Foster sang Bouncer originally, but my main issue with the original wording of the aricle was that it seemed to imply that Sullivan specifically scored the part for a Counter-Tenor voice, which the evidence of the score itself, combined with the known musical tastes of the time, make this very unlikely. 31.60.46.34 (talk) 22:43, 14 September 2022 (UTC)


 * Thanks! You should see our policy on referencing: WP:V. -- Ssilvers (talk) 00:46, 15 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Couldn't we just say "The part was written for John Foster, who sang counter-tenor, but the autograph score is mostly in the baritone range, with only a few parts slightly higher than the finalised score."? Cite the autograph score, etc. Adam Cuerden (talk)Has about 8.9% of all FPs. 19:35, 6 March 2024 (UTC)


 * I do not think it is at all clear that "only a few parts [were] slightly higher" than the "finalised score" (whichever one you mean by that), and you certainly can't give that level of detail without a ref. I just reviewed the language and made two clarifications to try and satisfy you, but I don't really see what the problem was.  We already had said that only part of the role was written in the alto range.  Any greater detail than that would surely require a ref. Frankly, this discussion is the tail wagging the dog.  -- Ssilvers (talk) 21:30, 6 March 2024 (UTC)

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