Musical (1982)


Musique: Charles Strouse
Paroles: Charles Strouse
Livret: Charles Strouse
Production à la création:

Once in China there was an Emperor so powerful and so protected that he was never able to be close to others and was unaware of the natural beauty of the world around him.

One day he heard of a nightingale which lived in the forest and which sang so beautifully that all the peasants were charmed. He commanded a lovely young palace maid to bring the nightingale to him.

The maid led the court to the forest where the nightingale lived and it was captured. The Nightingale became an immediate success at court and for a while she was the Emperor's best friend and most prized possession.

But her popularity soon waned and she became unhappy without her freedom. Finally she was replaced by technology - a mechanical bird - and so she escaped. Nobody, not even the Emperor, noticed that the Nightingale had flown away.

When the Emperor realised that the Nightingale was no longer by his side, and that you can't always posses what you love the most, he decided to cut himself off from the rest of the world with work. He became dejected and ill and was finally confronted by death.

But the power of beauty and innocent love (of the palace maid) triumphed over death.

The Emperor and the maid and the Nightingale, lived happily ever after.


The work premiered at the Buxton Festival and then in London at the Lyric Hammersmith beginning on December 18, 1982 with a cast including Sarah Brightman as the title character, Nightingale. In the U.S. a staged reading of the show was given by the First All Children's Theatre in New York in May 1982.[1] The group then gave a preview of the work in New York in March 1983 before the North American premiere at "The Barns" at Wolf Trap, Wolf Trap, Virginia, in April 1983.[2] Since then, the show has been performed numerous times throughout the world.


1. Prologue - Orchestra
2. Perfect Harmony - Company
3. Why Am I So Happy? - The Maid
4. Take Us To the Forest - Company
5. Who Are These People - Nightingale
6. Never Speak Directly to an Emperor - Palace Guards
7. Nightingale - Company
8. The Emperor is a Man - The Maid
9. I Was Lost - Emperor / Nightingale
10. Charming - Two Peacocks
11. A Singer Must Be Free - Nightingale
12. The Mechanical Bird - The Company / Mechanical Bird
13. Please Don't Make Me Hear That Song Again - Company / Mechanical Bird
14. Rivers Cannot Flow Upwards - The Maid, Nightingale
15. Death Duet - Death, Emperor, Maid and Nightingale
16. We Are China - Company

Aucun dossier informatif complémentaire concernant Nightingale (The) (Version Strouse)

Aucun dossier informatif complémentaire concernant Nightingale (The) (Version Strouse)


Version 1

Nightingale (The) (Version Strouse) (1982-12-Lyric Hammersmith-London)

Type de série: Original
Théâtre: Lyric Hammersmith (Londres - Angleterre)
Durée : 1 mois 1 semaine
Nombre :
Première Preview : 18 December 1982
Première: 22 December 1982
Dernière: 29 January 1983
Mise en scène : Peter James
Chorégraphie :
Producteur :
Star(s) :
Avec: Andrew Shore (Narrator) Sarah Brightman (The Nightingale), Gordon Sandison (Emperor) , Susannah Fellows (Palace Maid), Carole Brooke (Mechanical Nightingale), Jill Pert & Dinah Harris (The Peacocks) Michael Heath, Roy Skelton

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