Berkeley: a Dinner Engagement.(one act opera by Lennox Berkeley)

BERKELEY: A Dinner Engagement Kenny, Rutter, Rigby, Collins; Leggate, Fischer, Williams; City of London Sinfonia, Hickox. Texts and trans/ations. Chandos 10219

The best parties always converge in the kitchen, and so does the action in Lennox Berkeley's delectable one-act opera, A Dinner Engagement (1954). In Paul Dehn's straightforward libretto, the kitchen signifies more than the heart of the house; it is the source of comic misunderstandings, and more importantly, it levels the playing field among members of three distinct classes in postwar England. Lord and Lady Dunmow (accent on the second syllable, perhaps to indicate they had once "done more?") are dispossessed nobility. But they are not to be pitied or scorned; on the contrary, they cook, clean and spend what little money is left to keep their daughter Susan in new frocks and lipstick. Only occasionally does Lord Dunmow indulge in nostalgia for his earlier life as Envoy Extraordinary to the court of the ambiguously situated nation of Montehlanco. It's impossible to deride his contemplation of an earlier, fragrant life (a lovely, wistful aria for baritone, sensitively rendered by the superb Roderick Williams), since a few minutes prior, the poor man was rushing around his kitchen trying to correctly identify a colander. The chaotic preparations anticipate the imminent arrival for dinner of the Grand Duchess of Monteblanco and her shy, marriageable son, Philippe. In Gilbertian topsy-turvy fashion, the hired servant, Mrs. Kneebone, enters through the unprepossessing front door, while the Duchess enters through the larger, and more inviting, back door. The Duchess, never having been in a kitchen before, assumes Lady Dunmow has cleverly decorated her drawing room to resemble one. Upon learning the truth, she proves to be a game guest, rolling with punches that include burnt dinner, no toast for the pate and grounds hardly worth strolling.

Berkeley takes a neoclassical approach, and one can hear echoes of ...