Resuscitation of the Lost Orchestral score of the Monmouth Theater Group

A Monmouth Theater has recovered a Lost Orchestral score for John Osborne's play The Entertainer.

More than 50 years after the last time, the Center Theater in Monmouth carefully revived the complete orchestral score for the play, which was originally written by the Oscar winner John Addison.

Mr. Osborne, a remarkable modern British playwright with family connections in Newport, was passionate about music rooms, and this interest is reflected in the play.

Laurence Olivier and Joan Plowright showed the original production that came on stage in 1957.

Mr. Osborne made the songs, and Mr. Addison arranged it and also created overtures and side music for a band in the authentic music hall style.

When the director of Martin Newman from Center Theater secured the rights on playing, he was surprised to only maintain the piano score.

The full band score had been lost and most of the services since then have only rely on the piano.

After the copyright owners, Samuel French, had no record of the full score, the careful search for music began.

Despite thorough research in British archives and collections that do not achieve any results, the local production team followed some of the composer's own papers to Brigham Young University Library in Utah.

Dr. David Day and his team at the university exposed a lengthy box with the name “The Entertainer”, which contained 122 pages of the original manuscript music.

The theater group received the scanned manuscript, which was then subjected to a complex restoration process.

With the specialist knowledge of the music director of production, Ian Russell, a former main actor of the Welsh National Opera Orchestra, the faded manuscript pages for a band were converted into usable parts.

The revival of the score was celebrated as a historical achievement for the Small Town Theater Group.

Production will show a live band that plays authentic music, possibly for the first time in more than half a century.

The presentation of the entertainer by the Center Theater will be held on 19, 20th and 21st June at 7.30 p.m. three nights in the Savoy Theater in Monmouth.

Tickets are available on the theater website.