Wuthering Heights musical/Bernard J. Taylor

[philly03]

Wondering if anyone has ever seen a production play out of Bernard J. Taylor's Wuthering Heights the Musical. I recently re-found the concept recording, and actually enjoy some of the score. Apparently it's the only musical version the Bronte Society has endorsed.

This guy has quite a few musicals - Pride & Prejudice, Dracula, etc. but seems like they never reach larger stages.

[Mr Roxy]

His Dracula is called Nosferatu.

[Zenobia]

I saw it when it first opened in Heilbronn/Germany in 1997 - it was very much helped by a great charismatic leading man but otherwise forgettable.

The same theatre did Taylor's Pride & Prejudice later which was a horrible idea from the start as the novel relies on sharp dialogue and doesn't lend itself to musicalization at all. I was bored stiff.

I also just realize it was 17 years ago. Thanks for making me feel old...

[Mr Roxy]

I felt old 15 years ago.

[EricMontreal22]

I LOVE this concept album, it is brilliant camp. Here's a favorite song of mine, "Cathy!" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fK-Mha2522Y (They should have just renamed the musical Heathcliff!)

Taylor fascinates me. He must be independently wealthy, otherwise I have no idea how he has 15(!) works and actually quite a few recordings. (The rock musical Tom Brown: New Boy at School sounds genius.) http://www.bernardjtaylor.com/

[g.d.e.l.g.i.]

Except Heathcliff already existed.

No, really. It was a Cliff Richard vehicle.

[EricMontreal22]

I knew you would pop up in this thread! I remembered that Richards had a Wuthering musical but how could I forget it was called that??

[Zenobia]

Both came out around the same time. Taylor blamed Richard for ruining his chances to get Wuthering Heights staged big time in London. After the Heathcliff debacle nobody was going near that story again for a while and the era of the big weepies ended anyway.

[stewart81]

I'm working on new orchestrations for this score right now. It has a production in
The UK next year by an amateur group. We did the same last year for Pride and Prejudice which was produced twice in the UK in the last 12 months.

Bernard lives in Twxas these days and I've worked with him on the new scores
for a few years and he is as excited as ever. Opera Moderne in New York is developing his Fitzgerald score for production.

[henrikegerman]

For me it might have one advantage over other contemporary musical versions of classic novels: since I didn't much like the book, they couldn't ruin it for me.

[MHTY]

Woking Amateur Operatic Society (Surrey, England)is the company who will be performing Wuthering Heights 5 to 9 May 2015, and I am directing it, and really looking forward to it. The script is clever and Bernard Taylor has totally captured the spirit of the book and the characters.

[Mister Matt]

Wuthering Heights came out a few years before Heathcliff, but I actually enjoy quite a bit of the Heathcliff score. Unfortunately, it was just too much of a Cliff Richards vanity project and the production itself was ridiculous.

[stewart81]

I've been in touch with your MD Ian by email to discuss the revised score. Nothing in it is altering from the script/musical content but it is being tidied up throughout for the musicians.