Bernard J. Taylor
Encyclopedia
Taylor was born and educated in Cape Town
Cape Town
Cape Town is the second-most populous city in South Africa, and the provincial capital and primate city of the Western Cape. As the seat of the National Parliament, it is also the legislative capital of the country. It forms part of the City of Cape Town metropolitan municipality...
, South Africa
South Africa
The Republic of South Africa is a country in southern Africa. Located at the southern tip of Africa, it is divided into nine provinces, with of coastline on the Atlantic and Indian oceans...
. His forebears included John Taylor, the first British missionary to southern Africa. He left South Africa for England in 1969 and remained in England until 1998, after which he spent a year in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
before settling in the United States of America
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. He currently lives in San Antonio, Texas.
Neighbors And Lovers
Taylor's first musical show was Neighbors And Lovers (1987), self-produced at the Oast Theatre, TonbridgeTonbridge
Tonbridge is a market town in the English county of Kent, with a population of 30,340 in 2007. It is located on the River Medway, approximately 4 miles north of Tunbridge Wells, 12 miles south west of Maidstone and 29 miles south east of London...
, England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
. However, Taylor decided to abandon it in favour of creating a musical based on a universally known story.
Wuthering Heights
Taylor selected Emily BrontëEmily Brontë
Emily Jane Brontë 30 July 1818 – 19 December 1848) was an English novelist and poet, best remembered for her only novel, Wuthering Heights, now considered a classic of English literature. Emily was the third eldest of the four surviving Brontë siblings, between the youngest Anne and her brother...
's classic Wuthering Heights
Wuthering Heights
Wuthering Heights is a novel by Emily Brontë published in 1847. It was her only novel and written between December 1845 and July 1846. It remained unpublished until July 1847 and was not printed until December after the success of her sister Charlotte Brontë's novel Jane Eyre...
, composing the music. A concept album was released in 1991 with a cast of West End musical stars including a former "Phantom Of The Opera" Dave Willetts
Dave Willetts
Dave Willetts is an English singer and actor known for having leading roles in West End musicals.Willetts is something of an enigma in that he has had no formal singing, dancing, or acting lessons. Before he was 20 he rarely visited the theatre...
, as Heathcliff, Lesley Garrett
Lesley Garrett
Lesley Garrett CBE is an English musician, broadcaster and media personality.- Early life :Garrett was born in the town of Thorne near Doncaster in South Yorkshire, into a musical family. She attended Thorne Grammar School, where she performed in school plays and musicals. As she grew up she...
(Cathy Earnshaw), Bonnie Langford
Bonnie Langford
Bonita Melody Lysette "Bonnie" Langford is an English actress, dancer and entertainer. She came to prominence as a child star in the early 1970s then she subsequently became a companion of Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy's Doctor Who and has appeared on stage in various musicals such as Peter Pan:...
(Isabella Linton), Clive Carter (Hindley Earnshaw), Sharon Campbell (Ellen "Nelly" Dean) and James Staddon (Edgar Linton). It had its world premier at the Madison Theatre, Illinois, in 1993 and has since been performed in the UK, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Poland and Romania.
Success!
Meanwhile, Taylor turned his attention to something entirely different. Success! was a backstage musical, loosely based on Faust, and set in New York. Peppered with parody and pastiche, with additional lyrics by Vivian Wadham, its typical, and often cynical, view of the ups and downs of show business was accompanied by a jazzy and sometimes tender score, with Claire Moore, Lon Satton, Kathryn Evans, Jessica MartinJessica Martin
Jessica Martin is an actor and comedian. She is probably best known for her work as an impressionist and voice artist on the television series Spitting Image, impersonating the voice of Her Majesty The Queen. She also appeared on Yorkshire Television's 3-2-1 in the 1980s with impressionist Aiden J...
and Maurice Clarke forming the CD cast. The musical was revamped in 2006 and retitled "Make Me a Musical".
Pride And Prejudice
By the time Success! made its debut at the Civic Theatre, RotherhamRotherham
Rotherham is a town in South Yorkshire, England. It lies on the River Don, at its confluence with the River Rother, between Sheffield and Doncaster. Rotherham, at from Sheffield City Centre, is surrounded by several smaller settlements, which together form the wider Metropolitan Borough of...
, in September 1995, Taylor had returned to the classics, in the form of Jane Austen
Jane Austen
Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...
's Pride And Prejudice. With Claire Moore as Elizabeth Bennett and Peter Karrie
Peter Karrie
Peter Karrie , is a Welsh singer, best known for his portrayal of the lead role in the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, The Phantom of the Opera. He played the part in London, Toronto, Vancouver, Singapore, Hong Kong and on the UK Tour in Bradford, and Manchester...
in the role of Darcy, the concept album also featured Gay Soper
Gay Soper
Gay Soper is an English actress.She is perhaps best known for her performance in the musical Godspell with David Essex, Julie Covington and Jeremy Irons as well as Mme. Thenardier on the Complete Symphonic Recording of Les Misérables. She also performed all the voices for The Flumps, a famous...
, Janet Mooney, James Staddon and Christopher Biggins
Christopher Biggins
Christopher Kenneth Biggins is an English actor and media personality.-Career:Biggins was born in Oldham, Lancashire, England and brought up in Salisbury, Wiltshire, where he took elocution lessons and participated in local drama groups...
as Mr. Collins. Stand-out tracks, according to the Virgin Encyclopedia of Film and Stage Music (VEFSM), were considered to be "Through The Eyes Of A Child" "Good Breeding" and "Thank God They're Married". Pride And Prejudice was introduced to US audiences, complete with five new songs, by the Public Theatre Company of Peoria, Illinois
Peoria, Illinois
Peoria is the largest city on the Illinois River and the county seat of Peoria County, Illinois, in the United States. It is named after the Peoria tribe. As of the 2010 census, the city was the seventh-most populated in Illinois, with a population of 115,007, and is the third-most populated...
, in January 1995. Taylor's musical interpretation of the Austen novel was considered to be closer to its source than the 1959 Broadway version (see VEFSM), First Impressions (Austen's original title for the book), which starred Hermione Gingold
Hermione Gingold
Hermione Gingold was an English actress known for her sharp-tongued, eccentric persona, an image enhanced by her sharp nose and chin, as well as her deepening voice, a result of vocal nodes which her mother reportedly encouraged her not to remove. She starred on stage, on radio, in films, on...
. By 2008 there had been more than 20 productions of the show worldwide in the UK, Germany, Australia, New Zealand and the USA.
Nosferatu the Vampire
This production, (with additional lyrics by Eric Vickers), included numbers such as "Wild Talk Of Vampires", "And Sheep Shall Not Safely Graze", "Worms Feed On My Brains" "Ship Of The Dead" "Blasphemy" and "Somewhere At The Edges Of Creation". Once again, the album cast was led by Claire Moore (singer)Claire Moore (singer)
Claire Moore is an English soprano singer and actress, best known for her leading role as Christine in Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera and as Ellen in "Miss Saigon"....
(as Mina) and Peter Karrie
Peter Karrie
Peter Karrie , is a Welsh singer, best known for his portrayal of the lead role in the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, The Phantom of the Opera. He played the part in London, Toronto, Vancouver, Singapore, Hong Kong and on the UK Tour in Bradford, and Manchester...
(as Nosferatu), supported by Mario Frangoulis
Mario Frangoulis
Mario Frangoulis is a Greek tenor and is best known for his song, "Vincerò, Perderò". He sings in Italian, Spanish, English, French, and Greek; he is fluent in all 5 languages.-Early life:...
, former pop star Mark Wynter
Mark Wynter
Mark Wynter is an English actor and former singer, who had four Top 20 singles in the 1960s, including "Venus in Blue Jeans" and "Go Away Little Girl"...
, Barry James
Barry James
-Theatre credits:He trained at the Guildford School of Acting.His stage roles include:* Seymour in the first West End production of Little Shop of Horrors at the Comedy Theatre* as Otto Kringelein in "Grand Hotel " at the Dominion Theatre' 1992...
, Annalene Beechey and Simon Burke
Simon Burke
Simon Burke is an Australian actor. Burke began his acting career as a 13 year-old in the Australian film, The Devil's Playground for which he was awarded Best Actor at the 1976 Australian Film Institute Awards....
. The world premiere was staged at the Madison Theatre, Peoria, Illinois, in September 1995, and the show had its first European performances a month later in Eastbourne. The work has been translated into German, Spanish and Hungarian.
Much Ado
Having achieved considerable success with his adaptations on Brontë and Austen, Taylor looked to William ShakespeareWilliam Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
's Much Ado About Nothing
Much Ado About Nothing
Much Ado About Nothing is a comedy written by William Shakespeare about two pairs of lovers, Benedick and Beatrice, and Claudio and Hero....
, abbreviated to Much Ado (additional lyrics: Vickers). The CD cast included Paul McGann
Paul McGann
Paul McGann is an English actor who made his name on the BBC serial The Monocled Mutineer, in which he played the lead role...
(Benedick), Claire Moore
Claire Moore
Claire Mary Moore is an Australian politician. Moore was elected to the Australian Senate from Queensland in July 2001, representing the Australian Labor Party. Her term began on 1 July 2002....
(Beatrice), Simon Burke
Simon Burke
Simon Burke is an Australian actor. Burke began his acting career as a 13 year-old in the Australian film, The Devil's Playground for which he was awarded Best Actor at the 1976 Australian Film Institute Awards....
(Claudio), Janet Mooney (Hero), Barry James (Leonato), David Pendelbury (Dogberry) and Peter Karrie
Peter Karrie
Peter Karrie , is a Welsh singer, best known for his portrayal of the lead role in the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, The Phantom of the Opera. He played the part in London, Toronto, Vancouver, Singapore, Hong Kong and on the UK Tour in Bradford, and Manchester...
(Don John). Songs included "If I Could Write A Sonnet", "I'll Never Love Again", "The Sweetest Kiss", "Now I Hear Symphonies" and "This Strange Affliction Called Love" as well as the humorous "The Officers Of The Watch" and "Never Satisfied". It had its world premiere at Stratford on Avon, birthplace of Shakespeare, in 1996, and had its Continental European premiere in Budapest, Hungary, in 2006.
Millennium Suite
As the 90s drew to a close, Taylor, in collaboration with orchestrator Gareth Price, attempted "to portray some of the key developments in the advance of civilization over the past 1,000 years" via his Millennium Suite. Performed on CD by the Polish State Philharmonic Orchestra of Latowice, conducted by Jerzy Swoboda, the suite consisted of "The Birth Of Chivalry" "The Age Of Oppression" "The Enlightenment" "The Road To Democracy" and "The Triumph of Democracy".Passion's Progress
Encouraged by his latest reviews, Taylor composed another symphonic work, Passion's Progress, a suite of ten pieces tracing the development of a romantic relationship.After featuring on the majority of Taylor's concept albums, Claire Moore, who has starred in the West End in shows such as Aspects Of Love and The Phantom Of The Opera, released the solo CDs, "Songs From The Musicals Of Bernard J. Taylor" and "Child Of The Earth".
Liberty: The Siege of the Alamo
The end of the decade saw the creation of Liberty: The Siege of the Alamo, which had its world premiere at the Josephine Theater in San Antonio in 2000. It was translated into Spanish in 2003 by the Mexican playwright Erick Merino, who also translated Nosferatu in 1998.Snow White and The Evil Queen
Around 2004 Taylor began work on a series of four comic operas using the music of classical composers whose music was out of copyright. Taylor said he hoped to bring the music of the classical composers to a wider audience through these works. The first of these was "Snow White and The Evil Queen", which takes the classic fairy tale and gives the "Evil Queen" a more central role. Instead of a "mirror mirror on the wall", the story features a masochistic hairdresser who acts as the queen's stylist as well as her vanity mirror. The show uses the music of Beethoven and a section of his Violin Concerto becomes a Snow White song - "No More Miss Nice Girl" - while his 5th Symphony is used for the song "Snow White Must Die". A recording of the show was made at the J.B. Sowards Theatre in Ashland, Kentucky, in 2010 and featured on Youtube.The Corporate Pirate of Penzance
For this show, completed in 2007, Taylor took a number of the most popular songs of Gilbert and Sullivan and incorporated them into a pastiche that incorporates many of the usual narrative elements of a Gilbert and Sullivan story -- love across the social barriers, people not being who they seem to be, etc - and weaves them into a more modern story of a corporate mogul (a Franchise King, also known as the Corporate Pirate of Penzance) who is hoping his daughter will marry into the British aristocracy, and a penniless young poet who falls in love with the daughter. The show uses music from Pirates of Penzance, H.M.S. Pinafore, The Mikado, Iolanthe, Trial by Jury and The Gondoliers, mixing the music of Arthur Sullivan and the words of W.S. Gilbert with lyrics that reflect the modernized narrative. In 2011 the Texas Light Opera Company was set up by Nicole Erwin, in conjunction with the Josephine Theatre in San Antonio, Texas, to produce the show in 2012 as the first in a series of productions of the comic operas.Cinderella's Christmas Makeover
In 2008 Taylor began to revamp the Cinderella fairy tale using the music of Leo Delibes, W.A. Mozart, J.S. Bach, Jules Massenet, Carl Maria von Weber, Antonin Dvořák, Luigi Boccherini, Edvard Grieg, Josef Haydn, Felix Mendelssohn, Frederic Chopin, Jacques Offenbach, P.I. Tchaikovsky, and Camille St Saens. He also composed four additional pieces of music. In Taylor's version, Cinderella is given a make-over for a reality show and gets to meet a prince who falls immediately in love with her. But Cinderella rejects the prince because she is disturbed by his obsession with whether or not her feet will fit a glass slipper. She falls for a penniless courtier who rescues her from the slave traders to whom her stepmother tries to sell her. The show ends with the couple entering and winning a national talent show.The Marsh King's Daughter
One of Hans Christian Andersen's lesser-known fairy tales is considerably expanded and re-worked by Taylor in a comic opera using the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. This was completed in 2010. All four comic operas, plus two plays, were published in Britain by Stagescripts Ltd in 2010.Plays
In 2010 Taylor had two plays published in Britain by Stagescripts Ltd:Ghosts in The Afternoon
A play written in collaboration with Taylor's son, Simon, it tells the story of an introverted and burned-out writer who ends a hollow relationship with a married woman at the same time he rents a room in his city apartment to an extravert out-of-towner named Rachel, a generation younger than himself. He is torn between his attraction to her, his self-consciousness and his fear of involvement. The show was chosen to kick off the 2012 season at the Overtime Theatre in San Antonio, Texas, directed by award-winning director or Matthew Byron Cassi.The Lady of Shalott
This play with music was published by Stagescripts in the UK as "Hear a Song That Echoes". Inspired by the epic poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson, it tells the story of a young literary professor who keeps the world at a distance until she is challenged by the passion of a former student.Novels
Between 1997 and 2003, Bernard J. Taylor wrote a series of self-published suspense novels set in San Antonio, TexasSan Antonio, Texas
San Antonio is the seventh-largest city in the United States of America and the second-largest city within the state of Texas, with a population of 1.33 million. Located in the American Southwest and the south–central part of Texas, the city serves as the seat of Bexar County. In 2011,...
. There are 12 books in this series.http://www.stopyourekillingme.com/T_Authors/Taylor_Bernard-J.html In addition he has written another mystery novel, Running in the Dark, an autobiographical Feasting with Panthers, and a non-fiction book entitled "Beyond Gay Stereotypes"