Green Branch Opera, plays with music, pantomime, folk operas...
Home page APPEAL The operas and other works Green Branch productions Photographs Samples from the scores Listen to extracts Sitemap of this site Links to other sites Contact details	Sir Gawain and the Green Knight by Tim Porter Characters Sir Gawain Green Knight/Sir Bertilak King Arthur Gawain's page Lady Bertilak 3 Wassailers Chorus Instrumentation Flute Oboe Clarinet Bassoon Piano Percussion 1 (note) Percussion 2 (note) Violin Viola Cello Country Dance Band (note) Note - Percussion 1: Side drum, claves, suspended cymbal (soft stick), saucepan (G), low car hooter, clashed cymbals (share with Percussion 2), xylophone (F above middle C, G, A, B flat, C, D, E, F), glockenspiel (as xylophone) Note - Percussion 2: Bass drum, tambourine, triangle, maracas, suspended cymbal (hard stick), Indian cymbals, duck quacker, referee's whistle, bicycle horn (harsh), clashed cymbals (share with Percussion 1) Note - Country Dance Band: Should include an accordion and at least two melody instruments, violins preferably, but could be recorders/flutes. Other optional instruments include guitar, piano, string bass. Author's note All sorts of undercurrents run artlessly concealed in the traditional tale of "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight". Beneath its mirthful exterior, roots reach deep into Celtic myth. Irishmen will recognise it as an incident in the ancient saga of Cuchullain. The form in which it is best known, however, is a fourteenth century English poem, which treats it with remarkable imagination, and adds to it the element of "courtly love", as obligatory to the mediaeval storyteller as the "love interest" to a modern film-maker! This version attempts to combine the flavour of the mediaeval romance with that of the basic myth, so that we sense the mysteries of the seasons and rebirth at work within the lively tale. The way in which I have tried to do this is by presenting the action through the efforts of a band of wandering players, people who because of their closeness to the soil cannot help bringing out the essential qualities of the story. This they do with their dances and songs. "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" was originally produced at Bude in 1971. Tim Porter Part One Introduction and Melodrama In which the Green Knight issues a challenge Interlude The Months of the Year In which a year passes Part Two Gawain's Winter Journey In which our hero braves the elements Interlude The Gower Wassail In which the true spirit of Yuletide is invoked Part Three The Christmas Games at Castle Bertilak In which our hero faces perils of a very different sort Interlude John Barleycorn Wherein lies the central mystery Part Four The Green Chapel In which King Arthur's knights adopt a New Badge Back to Operas
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