Bridesmaids in the Cornish village of Rederring, paid to be ready every day for a possible wedding, extol the virtues of Rose Maybud, the village's most beautiful and eligible maiden. Since she won't make her choice until at least one of her admirers overcomes his shyness and proposes, the bridesmaids attempt to coax Rose's aunt, Dame Hannah, to get married and give them a chance to earn their stipends.

Alas, Dame Hannah's heart still belongs to Sir Roderic Murgatroyd, the late Baronet of Ruddigore, though he has been dead for ten years. She couldn't marry him because he, like all the baronets of Ruddigore, lived under a witch's curse that compelled him to commit a daily crime. Rose enters, and Hannah suggests the name of Robin Oakapple as a suitable suitor for her. Rose explains that, due to the circumstances of her infancy as a foundling, she adheres strictly to the rules of etiquette and cannot make the first move even if she does love him.

Shyly, Robin enters. He and Rose discuss how two shy people might make their love known to each other, but it never goes beyond the hypothetical, and she departs. Old Adam, Robin's servant, enters. We learn that Robin is really Sir Ruthven Murgatroyd and that he fled his home, living with a foster family to escape the Ruddigore curse, which fell then upon his younger brother, Despard.

In comes Richard Dauntless, Robin's foster brother, home from the sea. He flirts with the bridesmaids. Robin tells him of his predicament: he is in love with Rose but too shy to tell her. Richard, who is anything but shy, volunteers to woo Rose on Robin's behalf.

Not surprisingly, Richard falls in love with Rose in the process, and he "follows the dictates of his heart," wooing her for himself. When Robin returns to learn the outcome of the suit, the proxy arrangement is revealed, and Rose transfers her affection to him. They exit, and Mad Margaret enters. Her insanity results, she tells us, from her love of the wicked baronet, Sir Despard. She fears that Rose also loves Despard, but Rose explains that her affections lie elsewhere.

Grandly and ominously, Sir Despard enters. He warns everyone about the effects of a life of crime, then reveals that he is not all bad--he attempts to offset each crime with a good deed. Richard returns, and the latest dictate of his heart is to let Despard know Robin's true identity. Despard is overjoyed at the prospect of transferring the curse back to Ruthven (Robin). He retires to await his opportunity.

Saluting the long-anticipated wedding, the bridesmaids and townspeople assemble to welcome Rose and Robin. Sir Despard interrupts the celebration to reveal Robin's identity. Robin admits the deception, and Rose turns her affection to Despard. He virtuously redeems his pledge to Margaret. Unwilling to give up on marriage, Rose returns to Richard. With some weddings (albeit different ones) still expected, the celebration continues as Act I ends.

The scene changes to the interior of Castle Ruddigore with a gallery of portraits of the ancestral Baronets. Robin and Adam, greatly changed in demeanor, bemoan their painful new responsibilities. Richard and Rose enter to seek Robin's blessing on their marriage. After some blustering, he reluctantly gives it. They leave and Robin remains, worried lest the small crimes he has committed so far won't satisfy the dictates of the curse.

Over Robin's anxious supplication, the portraits come to life and the ancestors assemble to question and pass judgment upon him. They ridicule his puny excuses for crimes and demand he do something more drastic, such as kidnapping a lady. They give him a foretaste of the agonies they can inflict if he doesn't comply. He submits, and they return to their frames.

Knowing the consequences that await, Robin sends Adam out to carry off a lady--any lady. While Adam is gone, Despard and Margaret enter and plead with Robin to reform. Robin tells them he will defy his ancestors by going straight . . . but he has forgotten about the lady!

Enter Adam with a very belligerent Dame Hannah. Robin is so frightened that he calls out to the portrait of Sir Roderic to rescue him. When Roderic sees Dame Hannah, he sends Robin off in disgrace, and they have a tender reunion. Although affairs now seem to be in quite a muddle, the legal mind (i.e., Gilbert's) is equal to the challenge. Robin returns with an explanation that lifts the curse, and the opera ends--as these operas usually do--with lots of marriages and rejoicing.

-- Kurtiss Gordon

Overture

Act I:

1.	Fair is Rose	Bridesmaids and Zorah
2.	Sir Rupert Murgatroyd	Hannah and Bridesmaids
3.	If somebody there chanced to be	Rose
4.	I know a youth	Robin and Rose
5.	From the briny sea	Bridesmaids
6.	I shipped, d'ye see	Richard and Bridesmaids
	Hornpipe
7.	My boy, you may take it from me	Robin with Richard
8.	The battle's roar is over	Richard and Rose
9.	If well his suit has sped	Bridesmaids
10.	In sailing o'er life's ocean wide	Rose, Richard, and Robin
11.	Cheerily carols the lark	Margaret
12.	Welcome, gentry	Chorus
13.	Oh, why am I moody and sad?	Sir Despard and Chorus
14.	You understand?	Richard and Sir Despard
15.	Hail the bride	Chorus
	When the buds are blossoming	Rose and Hannah, with Richard, Adam, and Chorus
	Gavotte	Ensemble
	Hold, bride and bridegroom	Sir Despard, Rose, Robin, and Chorus
	As pure and blameless peasant	Robin and Chorus
	Within this breast	Richard and Chorus
	Farewell! Thou hadst my heart	Soli and Bridesmaids
	Oh, happy the lily	Soli and Chorus

Entr'acte

Act II:

16.	I once was as meek	Robin and Adam
17.	Happily coupled are we	Richard, Rose, and Bridesmaids
18.	In bygone days	Rose with Robin, Richard, and Bridesmaids
19.	Painted emblems of a race	Ancestors, Robin, and Sir Roderic
20.	When the night wind howls	Sir Roderic and Ancestors
21.	He yields!	Ancestors
22.	I once was a very abandoned person	Despard and Margaret
23.	My eyes are fully open	Robin, Despard, and Margaret
24.	There grew a little flower	Dame Hannah with Sir Roderic
25.	When a man has been a naughty baronet (finale)	Ensemble
26.	Oh, happy the lily (curtain call)	Ensemble

COSTUMES--Phyllis Jordan, Diane Kelton, and Elaine Walker, co-heads;

Elizabeth Ball, Janet Bowdan, Sandra Burgess, Esta Busi, Robert Campbell, Anne Clark, Jamieson M. Cobleigh, Hadley Crane, Andrew Firman, Lynde Firman, John Foster, Beverly Fuller, Courtney Gordon, Kurtiss Gordon, Doris Holden, Marese Hutchinson, Karen Jordan, David Kidwell, Jacqueline Haney Kidwell, Lindsey Larkin, Wendy Larson, Louise MacDonald, Rena Moore, Nina Pollard, Sandra Rossi, Mary Ellen Sailer, Carolyn Samonds, Sylvia Scharf, Lois Smith, Sally Venman

LIGHTING--Steve Morgan, head;

Ben Howard, Daniel Kent, Kelly Morgan, Aline Roy

MAKE-UP--Linda Stark, head;

Carol Lee, Catherine Lee, Alec Nelson, Sarah Patterson, Shirley Pérez

SET CONSTRUCTION and PAINTING--John Foster, head;

Charles Barto, Deborah Braswell, Sudro Brown, Robert Campbell, Jamie Cobleigh, Rachel Cobleigh, K. C. Conlan, Nicholas Dahlman, Matthew Denny, Anju Diggs, Kimaya Diggs, Makeda Diggs, Savita Diggs, Reed Elkinton, Jonathan Evans, Rhys Evans, Schuyler Evans, Greg Firman, Lynde Firman, Ben Gagnon, Bob Graham, John Healy, Kevin Hutchinson, Marese Hutchinson, Lew Jordan, Elysse Link, David Mix Barrington, Steve Morgan, David Mullins, Lee Pershyn, Jim Pistrang, Joe Pistrang, Nina Pollard, Matthew Riddle, Linda Stark, Dick Stromgren, Bill Venman, Jim Walker, Roy Williams

PROPERTIES--Marese Dolan Hutchinson, head;

John Foster, Gordon Freed, Judy Pistrang, and the costume crew

PROGRAM--Kurtiss Gordon, head;

Janet Bowdan, Nicholas Dahlman, Cami Elbow, Jonathan Evans, Paul E. Peelle, Lee Pershyn, Jim Walker, Fred Zinn

PUBLICITY and TICKETS--Steve Stoia, publicity; Laurel Kushi, tickets;

Lynne Rudié, poster design; Pat Desmarais, Donna Roy, Maryanna Whittemore, and Town of Amherst Leisure Services

BANNER PAINTING--Judi Pierce

USHERS

Donovan Arthen, Elizabeth Ball, Elizabeth Bragg, Jonas Bucciarelli, Sophie Bucciarelli, Asher Crane, Hadley Crane, Holland Crane, Meghan Devine, Sarah Devine, Paul DeVries, Makeda Diggs, Savita Diggs, Barry Elkinton, Chris Elkinton, Reed Elkinton, Margaret Evans, Charlie Forray, Barbara Freed, Rebecca Freed, Steve Henderson, Dixie Luddy, Marissa McKinney, Ian McPhail, Rebecca Sailer, Rob Sailer, Jillian Swan, Kenna Tyrrell, Janet Vance, Mira Vance, Killian Venman, Hannah Weisner, Danielle Wheeler, Chris Wood

COMPANY PHOTOGRAPHY

Gigi Kaeser, David Kidwell

GIFT SHOP--Mimi Cary, head;

Teddy Milne, Lee Pershyn

COMMISSARY--Mimi Cary, head;

Rena Moore, Paul E. Peelle, and cast

COMPANY PARTY

Jamieson M. Cobleigh, Barbara Freed, Erin Freed, Gordon Freed, Alan Harris, Paul E. Peelle

PERFORMANCE REFRESHMENTS--Amherst Regional High School Theatre Company

Elaine Crane -- Rose Maybud -- returns to VLO after last year's debut as Josephine in H.M.S. Pinafore. Other G&S roles have included Yum-Yum, Constance, Lady Saphir, and Edith. Recent favorite roles include Hodel (Fiddler on the Roof), Guenevere (Camelot), Squaw Sachem (in David MacAdam's original opera Song on the Wind), and the title role in Little Red Riding Hood, which she performs with Opera to Go, a company she founded in 2003. Offstage, Elaine homeschools her five children (ages 7-14). She invites you to visit her on the web at www.elainecrane.com.

Nicholas Dahlman -- Robin Oakapple -- has been acting in plays across the Pioneer Valley since 1993. This is his fourth production with VLO, having had a wonderful time in H.M.S. Pinafore, The Yeomen of the Guard, and Iolanthe. This past year at Amherst College, he was Professor Spaulding in C'est La Vie, Senex in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and Greg in the new drama Torn. He works in the IT Department at Amherst College.

Anju Soparkar Diggs -- Ruth -- returned to the world of Gilbert & Sullivan last year, after a 30+ year hiatus, for VLO's production of H.M.S. Pinafore. Previously, she played Mrs. Darling in Peter Pan with Amherst LSSE. Anju and her husband live in South Hadley where they homeschool their three children. She is thrilled to see her daughter, Kimaya, making her G&S debut at about the same age as Anju was in her first production of Ruddigore.

Kimaya Diggs -- the Boy -- is performing in her first G&S production. She is a sixth grader at the "Diggs Boarding School." Previous theatre experiences include Big with South Hadley Community Theater, Annie with Arena Civic Theater, and Peter Pan with Amherst LSSE. Kimaya plays piano and cello, and sings with Hampshire Choral Society Young People's Chorus. She also loves modern dance, soccer, and fencing.

Jonathan Evans -- Richard Dauntless -- is performing in his third VLO production. He played Ralph Rackstraw in H.M.S. Pinafore last year and in 2002 had a minor lead role in The Yeomen of the Guard. He is pleased to be sharing the stage again with his daughter, Schuyler. By day, Jonathan is a freelance writer specializing in financial, corporate, and marketing communications. He lives and works in Amherst.

Schuyler Evans -- the Girl -- returns to the VLO stage after playing the Midshipmite last year in H.M.S. Pinafore. Schuyler is a sixth grader at The Hartsbrook School in Hadley, where one of her favorite activities is the annual class play. In addition to acting, she plays the violin and enjoys playing soccer and ultimate frisbee.

Alan Harris -- Sir Roderic -- last appeared with VLO as Sgt. Merryll in The Yeomen of the Guard (1990). He studied classical theater at Carnegie Tech and Florida State University, avant-garde theater in Paris with Le Grand Magic Circus, performed locally with ABIA Theatre's Land Of The Free, and pursued playwriting and directing with the mid-'90s Valley group Playwrights in Progress. Besides his love of opera, Alan is a chef and owner of Noble Feast Catering. He lives in Shelburne Falls with his wife, Jane.

Lindsey Larkin -- Zorah -- recently portrayed Dorothy in the Amherst LSSE production of The Wizard of Oz. She has appeared in a variety of musicals and plays, including South Pacific (as Nellie Forbush), The Mystery of Edwin Drood (Helena Landless), and The Threepenny Opera (Polly Peachum). Lindsey was a member of the summer performance training company at the 2003 Berkshire Theatre Festival. She is pursuing a BA in Theater at UMass Amherst. This is her VLO debut.

Matthew Roehrig -- Sir Despard -- is appearing in his twentieth role with VLO. Audiences will remember him as the Fairy Queen in Iolanthe, Ludwig in The Grand Duke, Colonel Fairfax in The Yeomen of the Guard, and Capt. Corcoran in last year's H.M.S. Pinafore. His other Pioneer Valley performances include Petruchio in The Taming of the Shrew, Benedick in Much Ado About Nothing, and El Gallo in The Fantasticks. He also appears regularly as a recitalist. Matt is a sixth grade teacher in Belchertown.

Emily Spura -- Mad Margaret -- joins VLO this season after a five-year hiatus from the stage. Before that, she was very active in the Providence, RI, area in such roles as Golde in The Fiddler on the Roof and Jo March in Little Women. Emily graduated from Smith College in 2003, after spending most of her time in the music department and giving a senior vocal recital. She hasn't left Smith yet, and now works there as the assistant to the musical ensembles. She lives in Hadley.

Lisa Woods -- Dame Hannah -- is making her VLO debut. Lisa will be heard this season with Arcadia Players and the Friends of Music at Guilford. She has been a soloist with the Hampshire Choral Society, the Pioneer Valley Symphony Chorus, and the American Guild of Organists. She also appeared with Commonwealth Opera and, last season, sang the role of the mother in the concert reading of the new opera The Captivation of Eunice Williams. A Pioneer Valley native, Lisa attended the New England Conservatory of Music and the Munich Conservatory of Music summer program. She is currently a student of Paulina Stark.

Gregory Young -- Old Adam Goodheart -- sang through the first 17 seasons of VLO. In the long interim, he has portrayed Sancho in The Man of La Mancha at the Shea Theatre, Luther Billis (South Pacific) and Frank (Showboat) for Commonwealth Opera, and Drosselmeyer for four Pioneer Valley Ballet productions of Nutcracker. Greg volunteers at Mystic Seaport as an engineer on the steamboat "Sabino" on weekends and lives in Northampton with his wife, Lucy.

Graham Christian -- Choreographer -- is in his first "tour of duty" with VLO, but he has been a devotee of the Savoy operas since childhood. Graham brings his experience as a dancer, dance teacher, and choreographer to this production. He lives in Pelham.

Allison Clayton -- Stage Manager -- joins VLO for the first time for Ruddigore, which is also her first G&S experience. Most recently, she stage- and production-managed A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum at Amherst College. When not in the theater, she may be found playing French horn in the Amherst College orchestra or studying in the graduate Computer Science program at UMass.

Jamieson M. Cobleigh -- Producer -- helped produce last year's H.M.S. Pinafore. He also works backstage with Amherst Leisure Services. Jamie joined VLO as a member of the tenor chorus in The Grand Duke (2001), then played the parts of First Citizen in The Yeomen of the Guard (2002) and Associate Counsel in Trial by Jury (spring 2003). He sings with the College Church Minstrels and has performed with the St. Brigid's Players. Jamie is a graduate student in Computer Science at UMass. He and his wife, Rachel, live in Amherst.

K.C. Conlan -- Assistant Music Director -- appeared with VLO for the first time last year in H.M.S. Pinafore. She teaches vocal music at the Common School in Amherst and directs the Hampshire Choral Society Young People's Chorus. She performed as a teenager with the Ridgewood (NJ) Gilbert & Sullivan Opera Company, and is pleased to be sharing her enjoyment of G&S with her own teenage daughter Rosalie.

Joseph Donohue -- Stage Director -- directed last year's production of H.M.S. Pinafore, rounding out a cycle in which he played the Captain in VLO's inaugural production of that opera and Dick Deadeye in between. He has performed many of the other bass/baritone roles in G&S operas as well, from King Gama to Pooh-Bah. Joe lives in Easthampton, in a house that began as a dairy farm, where he gardens and carries on his profession of theater historian. On odd days he still teaches at the University in Amherst.

John Foster -- Technical Co-Director -- joined VLO in the spring production of The Grand Duke eighteen years ago. He has been a regular member of the chorus ever since, and served a four-year stint as a producer. Over the years, he has built many of the props and special effects. John was a Professor of Biology at Hampshire College for 25 years before retiring ten years ago. He lives in Amherst with his wife Nancy. His daughter Lorena Healy and son-in-law John Healy have sung principal roles in previous productions.

Bob Graham -- Technical Co-Director -- returns for his fourteenth year with VLO. He has been a technical director for nine shows, a producer for five, and a VLO Board member for three years. A central Michigan native, he began his theatrical career as the production assistant and stage manager for the University of Michigan Student Players. While stationed with the U. S. Army in Tokyo, he was stage manager for the Ernie Pyle Players as well as playing The Monk in The Lady's Not for Burning. In his other life, he is Professor Emeritus of Computer Science at UMass.

Richard Gregory -- Costume Designer -- joins us for his eighteenth VLO production. He has designed costumes for most of VLO's shows since 1985. He also directed one of those productions (Utopia, Ltd.) and designed sets for three others. Dick has been seen on the boards as Cupid in Thespis and the Duke of Plaza Toro in The Gondoliers. He has designed sets and costumes for several Commonwealth Opera productions and for dozens of Williston Theatre productions, many of which he directed. Now retired from The Williston-Northampton School, he has joined the faculty of The Northampton Community Music Center.

Juli E. Holmes -- Music Director and Conductor -- is in her fourth season wielding the baton for our fall production. She is in her first year as band director for the Amherst Regional Middle School and teaches instrumental music in Pelham, Crocker Farm, and Wildwood Elementary Schools. Juli is an active horn player and regularly performs with the Pioneer Valley Symphony and Massachusetts Wind Orchestra. At home she's the chief taxi driver, cook, and mom to two teenage girls active in music, theater, and sports.

Jacqueline Haney Kidwell -- Coordinating Producer -- has been involved with VLO every year since Princess Ida in 1995, doing a little of everything. She also works with Westfield Theatre Group and Amherst Leisure Services Community Theatre, and is on the board of Holyoke Civic Symphony. Jacki and her husband, David, live in Leeds with two spoiled cats.

Steve Morgan -- Lighting Designer -- has been involved with VLO since 1977 as performer (most recently as Sergeant Meryll in 2002 in The Yeomen of the Guard), producer, technician, and occasional designer. Recent lighting projects have included last year's H.M.S. Pinafore for VLO, Welcome, Yule! at Frontier Regional HS, and two Amherst Ballet productions at the Eric Carle Museum. He lives in Leverett with his wonderful family of people and dogs and spends inordinate amounts of time with Hampshire Shakespeare Company and The Amherst Center for Stage and Screen.

Ken Samonds -- Set Designer -- designed the last two years' sets and appeared in cameo roles on stage as well. His first connection with VLO was as the "slender young baritone in the rigging" of our 1984 production of H.M.S. Pinafore. He has designed sets for Arena Civic Theater (Greenfield), Victory Players (Holyoke), Cambridge Community Players, Westfield Theater Group, and four VLO shows in the late 1980s. Ken is a retired Professor of Nutrition at UMass.

Linda Stark -- Make-up Designer -- is designing make-up for her eighth VLO production. Linda studied fine art and received a degree in interior design at the University of Connecticut. She also studied painting in Italy and watercolor in New York, under the instruction of well-known American artists Sondra Frectleton and Jack Beal. Linda has lived in Amherst for 31 years. She is the mother of four and a grandmother. She is a trained pastry chef and runs a home business making special occasion cakes.

Elaine Walker -- Producer and Costume Coordinator -- has been involved in VLO productions every year since 1980, first as a soprano in the chorus. She soon took on duties in the costume shop and has been a producer on and off for several years. She also co-founded and co-produced several musical shows with the St. Brigid's Players. In "real" life, Elaine recently retired from Hampshire College, where she supervised the costume shop. The extra time allows her to spend more time with her family, especially her six grandchildren.

Jim Walker -- Producer -- played third trombone in the orchestra of VLO's 1980 production of The Gondoliers. Every year since then, he has been on stage in the tenor section of the chorus. He also serves VLO as treasurer (since 1996). Jim is one of the founding members of St. Brigid's Players of Amherst. He recently retired from a 35-year career at UMass as a faculty member in physics, Associate Dean for Undergraduate Advising, and Acting Dean of the Graduate School.

Very few late Victorian dramatists could command such a range of styles as W. S. Gilbert. Even fewer could match Gilbert's abiding love for all things theatrical--an affection especially telling when he could turn conventions inside out and upside down. Known for his extravaganzas, burlesques, farces, pantomimes, and comedy-dramas, and even better known for comic operas written to music by Arthur Sullivan, Gilbert had kept a warm place in his heart for the excesses of rip-roaring melodrama. In 1886 he made a bold foray into that perennial genre, in the form of a Savoy opera originally called Ruddygore. When first-night audiences complained that the title sounded too much like "Bloody Gore," Gilbert altered the spelling to Ruddigore--but kept intact its ripe melodramatic features, along with their trademark Gilbertian inversions.

Intended, Gilbert explained, as a "caricature" of gory nautical and domestic plays, favorites of popular audiences, Ruddigore focused on a long-standing witch's curse on the aristocratic Murgatroyds. Gilbert's main source for his grisly plot was Harrison Ainsworth's Rookwood, a sensational 1834 novel enjoying an extended afterlife on the melodramatic stage. Rookwood and Ruddigore each portray the varied fortunes of a contrasting pair of brothers, one of whom lives as a peasant, the other as the heir. In each case, the peasant on assuming his title metamorphoses into a villain and loses the girl he loves; but Gilbert's topsy-turvy strategy applies a transformation of this type to almost his entire cast of characters, exchanging the familiar moral attributes of hero, heroine, villain, sailor, and madwoman for their effective opposites. Rose Maybud, the scrupulous young maiden pining for a husband, proves to be a schemer who manipulates the dictates of her book of etiquette to her own substantial advantage. Richard Dauntless, foster brother of the hero, Robin Oakapple, his heart overflowing with a sailor's brotherly love, agrees to act as Robin's go-between until, astonished by Rose's loveliness, he follows his "heart's dictates" and proposes to her himself. Sir Despard Murgatroyd, Robin's "thoroughly bad" younger brother, who, believing Robin dead, has born the brunt of the family curse, discovers his error from that dauntless hypocrite Richard and is transformed into a placid, proper middle-class person. The love-lorn Mad Margaret, borrowed from Madge Wildfire in Walter Scott's The Heart of Midlothian, is tamed into schoolmarmish respectability by her old lost love, Sir Despard. And in the famous apparition scene, in which the Murgatroyd portraits come to life and threaten Robin, now the "bad baronet" Sir Ruthven (say "Rivven") Murgatroyd, with unspeakable tortures unless he carries out the requisite daily crime, the ancestors prove to be a jovial, carefree bunch of old boys who hoof it nightly through the family cemetery. Gilbert's hilarious send-up of unbending melodramatic morality becomes even more laughable in its operatic incarnation in one of Sullivan's brightest, most delicious musical scores.

Searching for a compatible style for this Valley Light Opera revival of Ruddigore, last January I visited a wonderful London exhibit of Victorian toy theatres. The warm primary colors of the settings and costumes and the bold profiles and fierce gestures of their cardboard characters convinced me I had found what was needed. What could make for a more appropriate staging of Gilbert's delightful spoof of Victorian moral absolutes than a make-believe late Victorian parlor entertainment? We hope VLO audiences will applaud the hero and heroine and hiss the villain in thorough-going melodramatic fashion--that is, if they are able to figure out which is which . . .

-- Joseph Donohue

Valley Light Opera expresses thanks to the following for helping to make this production possible: the Amherst-Pelham Regional Schools' staff, especially the staff of the Superintendent's Office, the music and theater faculty, and the custodial staff, particularly Mike Riley, for their good nature, flexibility, and unstinting support; the Town of Amherst Department of Public Works for hanging the banner; Gemmy Peelle for the donation of her priceless collection of buttons and buckles; Glenn Siegel and WMUA for public service announcements; the UMass Fine Arts Center for production assistance; and to Sally and Bill Venman for caring for the VLO year-round and always being there when we sought advice.

Valley Light Opera is on the World Wide Web at http://www.vlo.org/. We express our gratitude and appreciation to BerkshireNet for hosting our site. BerkshireNet (http://www.berkshire.net/) provides Internet service to Massachusetts and New Hampshire.

Valley Light Opera, Inc., is a nonprofit Massachusetts corporation founded in 1975 by a group of Gilbert and Sullivan devotees. Over the years, VLO has been guided by two principles--to promote broad community participation and to produce fine entertainment. The company has produced all fourteen of the G&S operas as well as Cox and Box, The Zoo, The Rose of Persia, and Sullivan's oratorio The Prodigal Son. In addition, VLO has performed Rudolf Friml's The Vagabond King, Jacques Offenbach's Orpheus in the Underworld, John Philip Sousa's El Capitan, Warren Martin's The True Story of Cinderella, and several of Peter Schickele's P.D.Q. Bach works.

The affairs of VLO are in the hands of a Board of Directors elected by the membership at the Annual Meeting in February or March. Officers of the Board this year are Glen Gordon (President), Kurtiss Gordon (Clerk), and James Walker (Treasurer). Members of the Board are Richard Asebrook, Connie Cappelli, Jamieson M. Cobleigh, Barbara Davis, Jim Ellis, Erin Freed, Phyllis Jordan, Elysse Link, Ken Moore, Paul E. Peelle, and Lee Pershyn.

Donations to Valley Light Opera are tax deductible to the extent permitted by law.

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