Royston Nash
Conductor who revived Gilbert and Sullivan’s forgotten operas
ROYSTON NASH, who has died aged 82, was music director of the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company during the 1970s, a period that included its centenary celebrations in 1975, a royal command performance at Windsor Castle in the silver jubilee year and two tours of America.
The D’Oyly Carte was set up in 1875 to stage Gilbert and Sullivan’s operettas. However, its reliance on tried-and-trusted productions and the costs of spending 48 weeks a year on tour meant that by Nash’s time the company was struggling both artistically and financially.
He helped to broaden its horizons somewhat. As well as popular G&S fare – The Mikado, Iolanthe, Trial by Jury, Pirates of Penzance, all performed at Sadler’s Wells and in the regions – Nash delved into the Victorian duo’s back catalogue. For example, in 1971 he conducted The
Sorcerer, a tale of villagers who try a love potion that causes them to fall for the first person they see, which had not been performed by the company since 1939. Other rediscovered G&S operettas on his watch included The Zoo, a farce about two pairs of lovers, and The Grand Duke, the final Savoy opera.
For the company’s centenary Nash conducted the first staging since 1893 of Utopia Limited, a satire on corporate liability. Meanwhile, at a centenary gala at the Savoy Theatre in March 1975, Harold Wilson, the prime minister, declared the D’Oyly Carte to be “part of our national birthright”. Two years later, Nash conducted HMS
Pinafore in the presence of the Queen in the Waterloo Chamber at Windsor Castle, where Queen Victoria had seen The Gondoliers some 86 years earlier.
Royston Hulbert Nash was born in Southampton on July 23 1933. His parents moved the family to Bournemouth in 1942 to avoid the German bombing raids on Southampton. He was 16 when he joined the Royal Marines School of Music as a trumpeter; six years later he enrolled at the Royal Academy of Music, studying trumpet under George Eskdale and taking a course in conducting.
Back in the Royal Marines, and by now with a commission, Nash was promoted to bandmaster and spent a period as director of music to the Commander-in-Chief, Mediterranean, where he also worked with the Malta Choral Society.
His first appearance with the D’Oyly Carte Company was at Sadler’s Wells in March 1970 when, as Captain Nash, he led the Royal Marines’ band on stage during the last performance of the season of HMS Pinafore. He joined the company in September 1970 as assistant to James Walker, who he succeeded as music director six months later.
Nash and the D’Oyly Carte Company also made a number of well-received G&S recordings with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra for Decca, including The Mikado in 1974 starring John Reed, the company’s long-serving tenor.
Opinions were divided about Nash’s tenure with the D’Oyly Carte. Critics frequently commended his work in the pit as admirable. However, Tony Joseph in his 1994 history of the D’Oyly Carte Company wrote that “he had never seemed entirely at ease in the job”.
After leaving the company, Nash, a charismatic and engaging figure, emigrated to America. In 1980 he became conductor of the Cape Cod Symphony Orchestra, where he was a popular local maestro for 27 years. Here he was able to broaden his repertoire, including notable performances of works such as Elgar’s The
Dream of Gerontius with the Royal Choral Society on their US visit in 2002.
Royston Nash is survived by his wife, Lois Barry, and their son. Another son predeceased him.