I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General lyrics
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Language:
English
Album:
The Pirates of Penzance
I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General
[Major-General:]
I am the very model of a modern Major-General,
I've information vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I know the kings of England, and I quote the fights historical
I'm very well acquainted, too, with matters mathematical,
I understand equations, both the simple and quadratical,
About binomial theorem I'm teeming with a lot o' news,
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.
[Chorus:]
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse.
With many cheerful facts about the square of the hypote-potenuse.
[Major-General:]
I'm very good at integral and differential calculus;
I know the scientific names of beings animalculous:3
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.
[Chorus:]
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
He is the very model of a modern Major-General.
[Major-General:]
I know our mythic history, King Arthur's and Sir Caradoc's;4
I answer hard acrostics, I've a pretty taste for paradox,
I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus,5
In conics I can floor peculiarities parabolous;
I know the croaking chorus from The Frogs of Aristophanes9
Then I can hum a fugue of which I've heard the music's din afore,
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore.10
[Chorus:]
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pinafore
And whistle all the airs from that infernal nonsense Pina-pinafore
[Major-General:]
Then I can write a washing bill in Babylonic cuneiform,11
And tell you ev'ry detail of Caractacus’s12uniform:
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
I am the very model of a modern Major-General.
[Chorus:]
In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral,
He is the very model of a modern Major-General.
[Major-General:]
When such affairs as sorties17 and surprises I'm more wary at,
And when I know precisely what is meant by "commissariat"18
When I have learnt what progress has been made in modern gunnery,
When I know more of tactics than a novice in a nunnery—
In short, when I've a smattering of elemental strategy—
You'll say a better Major-General has never sat a gee.19
[Chorus:]
You'll say a better Major-General has never sat a gee
You'll say a better Major-General has never sat a gee
You'll say a better Major-General has never sat a sat a gee
[Major-General:]
For my military knowledge, though I'm plucky and adventury
Has only been brought down to the beginning of the century20
But still, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral
I am the very model of a modern Major-General
[Chorus:]
But still, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral
He is the very model of a modern Major-General.
- 1. The Battle of Marathon: the Athenians and Spartans defeated the Persians at Marathon, near Athens, in 490 B.C.
- 2. British forces led by Wellington defeated Napoleon’s army in Belgium at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815.
- 3. Animalcules: a family of small or microscopic animals. The Dutch scientist Antonie van Leeuwenhoek coined the term in the late seventeenth century
- 4. Sir Caradoc was a knight of King Arthur’s Round Table.
- 5. Heliogabalus was a Roman emperor who reigned between 218-222 A.D. and was notorious for his loose morals and lax rule.
- 6. Raffaello Sanzio (1483-1520) a legendary Italian painter
- 7. Gerard Dou: a Dutch painter from Leyden (1613-75) who studied with Rembrandt
- 8. ”Zoffany” was the pseudonym of Johann Zauffely (1733-1810), a Bohemian-British painter who was a member of the British Royal Academy.
- 9. Aristophanes was a Greek playwright born 450 B.C. “The Frogs” is one of his classic comedies, produced 405 B.C. in Athens.
- 10. H.M.S. Pinafore was Gilbert and Sullivan’s previous (and very successful) opera.
- 11. Cuneiform: the wedge-shaped writing on clay tablets from ancient Mesopotamia.
- 12. Caractacus was an early British king who fought the Romans in the first century A.D.
- 13. Mamalon: a rounded hillock or mound.
- 14. Ravelin: A detached earthwork cinstruction connected to a fort.
- 15. Mauser rifle: a German firearm, manufactured starting in the 1870s that would have seemed state-of-the-art to a Victorian audience. Gilbert’s original line was actually “a Chassepôt rifle,” referring to an older rifle which was still current in 1879, but he updated it to the more modern Mauser in later productions.
- 16. Javelin: a light spear designed to be thrown, and one of the the most ancient weapons known to man.
- 17. Sorties: sudden movements of troops from a defensive position.
- 18. Commissariat: The army’s supply department.
- 19. A gee: on horseback.
- 20. That would be the beginning of the nineteenth century!
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Comments 1
This is the D’Oyly Carte 1929 recording, with the Chorus and Light Opera Orchestra conducted by Sir Malcolm Sargent. This would have been a very early 78 rpm record set.
The principal comedian at the time was Sir Henry Lytton. However when this recording and the 1928 Yeomen of the Guard were made, Sir Henry was touring the United States, and so George Baker, a contract singer with an excellent reputation, filled in for him as the Major-General.
Cast
Major-General: George Baker
Pirate King: Peter Dawson
Samuel: Stuart Robertson
Frederic: Derek Oldham
Sergeant of Police: Leo Sheffield
Mabel: Elsie Griffin
Edith: Nellie Briercliffe
Kate: Nellie Walker
Ruth: Dorothy Gill
Recorded in London,
February 19 – May 15, 1929