Thespis (Sullivan, Arthur)

Thespis; or, The Gods Grown Old is Sullivan's first operatic collaboration with W. S. Gilbert. The music is mostly lost, but some bits remain. These are:

1. The song "Little Maid of Arcadee", published in piano and voice reduction for the parlour ballad market.
2. The song "Climbing over rocky mountain", reused in The Pirates of Penzance with some lyrical changes and with the men's harmonies removed. These harmonies survive in the Pirates autograph score, which has several pages of a copy score of Thespis pasted in (with the men's harmonies crossed out).
3. Three of five movements of a ballet, probably from Act II, found with scores for Sullivan's other ballets, with plausible suggestions for parts of other works that he may have cannibalised for the remaining two movements.

The libretto survives, though it doesn't appear to represent the final state of the opera, since reviews of Thespis quote dialogue, describe scenes that do not appear in it, and discuss a character, Venus, that does not appear (at least by that name) in the libretto as published.

Sheet Music

• Scores (0)
• Parts (0)
• Vocal Scores (5)
• Arrangements and Transcriptions (0)
• Libretti (0)
• Other (0)
• Source Files (0)

Vocal Scores

Little Maid of Arcadee (Act II, No.10)

 Complete Score
*#742598 - 3.05MB, 4 pp. -  0.0/10 2 4 6 8 10 (-) - V/V/V - 22×⇩ - Feduol

PDF scanned by US-NYpm
Feduol (2021/11/3)

Publisher. Info. Holograph manuscript, 1872. (June 2). Copyright Public Domain [tag/del] Misc. Notes This file is part of the Submission Project. Purchase Javascript is required for this feature.

 Complete Score
*#786678 - 0.21MB, 5 pp. -  0.0/10 2 4 6 8 10 (-) - V/V/V - 34×⇩ - Dbmiller

PDF scanned by HathiTrust
Dbmiller (2022/6/3)

Editor Erminia Rudersdorff (1822–1882) Publisher. Info. Boston: White, Smith & Co., n.d.(ca.1870s). Plate 1679-5. Copyright Public Domain [tag/del] Purchase Javascript is required for this feature.

 Complete Score (manuscript version)
*#979749 - 0.07MB, 4 pp. -  0.0/10 2 4 6 8 10 (-) - !N/!N/!N - 35×⇩ - Dbmiller

PDF typeset by editor
Dbmiller (2025/7/9)

 Complete Score (published version)
*#979750 - 0.07MB, 4 pp. -  0.0/10 2 4 6 8 10 (-) - !N/!N/!N - 44×⇩ - Dbmiller

PDF typeset by editor
Dbmiller (2025/7/9)

Editor Marc Shepherd Publisher. Info. Riverdale: Oakapple Press, 2011. Copyright Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 [tag/del/mrg] Misc. Notes Two versions of the song; one is based on the state in Sullivan's manuscript, while the other reflects the state in the first published edition. Purchase Javascript is required for this feature.

 Complete Score
*#347151 - 0.06MB, 9 pp. -  0.0/10 2 4 6 8 10 (-) - !N/!N/!N - 546×⇩ - Savoyardta1

PDF typeset by editor
Savoyardta1 (2014/10/7)

Editor Ian Bond Publisher. Info. Ian Bond, 2014. Copyright Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 [tag/del] Purchase Javascript is required for this feature.

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