Donald Adams

Charles Donald Adams (20 December 1928 – 8 April 1996) was an English opera singer and actor, best known for his performances in bass-baritone roles of the Savoy operas with the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and his own company, Gilbert and Sullivan for All. While still at school, he made his first professional appearance as an actor in 1944 with the BBC Repertory Company. He studied with an Italian singing teacher in London, Rodolfo Melle (who had sung at La Scala with the tenor Aureliano Pertile), who taught Adams to sustain the vowels of a word before reaching the consonants. This, Adams said, gave the voice "a nice line", and he continued to practise Melle's lessons until the end of his life.

Adams interrupted his fledgling stage and radio career to serve in the British Army, where he acted as resident producer of the Army Repertory Theatre at Catterick Camp. and was a member of the quartet, The Regal Four. He also appeared in pantomime at the Euston Theatre in King's Cross. Kitty McShane asked Adams to go on tour with her and Arthur Lucan (Kitty and Old Mother Riley), during which Lucan suggested that Adams combine his singing and acting and audition for the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company.

Adams was hired by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company as a chorister in 1951 and soon began to play the small roles of Bill Bobstay in H.M.S. Pinafore, Samuel in The Pirates of Penzance, Second Yeoman in The Yeomen of the Guard, and Antonio in The Gondoliers, The next season, he took over the principal role of Captain Corcoran in H.M.S. Pinafore and substituted for the ailing Alan Styler as Cox in Cox and Box, the Counsel in Trial by Jury and Grosvenor in Patience. He also appeared once as Old Adam Goodheart in Ruddigore and soon began to play the Lieutenant of the Tower in The Yeomen of the Guard. Adams also began to fill in for the ageing Darrell Fancourt, who missed an increasing number of performances, as the Pirate King in Pirates, Colonel Calverley in Patience, the Earl of Mountararat in Iolanthe, the title role in The Mikado and Sir Roderic Murgatroyd in Ruddigore. Although he had admired Fancourt, when he took over the roles, Adams asked Bridget D'Oyly Carte if he could create his own characterisations, which she agreed to, saying she would tell him if he overstepped the mark. Pooh-Bah in The Mikado, Alcindoro/Benoit in La bohème in 1991, the Woodcutter in Königskinder in 1992, Mumlal in The Two Widows in 1993, Quince in A Midsummer Night's Dream in 1995, and Don Pasquale (1996). For Welsh National Opera, between 1985 and 1987, he appeared as Monterone in Rigoletto, Zeta in The Merry Widow and the Theatre Director and the Banker in Lulu. His Baron Ochs in Der Rosenkavalier (1990) for WNO was described by The Independent as "a triumph for the singer, now 62 years of age, and no longer in his finest or freshest voice, but who made up for any vocal deficiency by the marvellously subtle way he handled the text". His other international work included Schigolch in Lulu for Canadian Opera in 1991, Rossini's Bartolo in Amsterdam, the Sacristan in Tosca in Geneva (June 1987) and the Mikado in Los Angeles (with Dudley Moore).

He also continued to record, especially with Charles Mackerras and Welsh National Opera, appearing as Sergeant Meryll in the Welsh National Opera production of Yeomen 1994–95, the first Gilbert and Sullivan production staged at the Royal Opera House. He died in Norwich, England, at the age of 67 of a brain tumour.

Recordings Adams recorded prolifically. With the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and Decca Records, he recorded Sergeant Bouncer in Cox and Box (1961), the Usher in Trial by Jury (1964), the Notary in The Sorcerer (1953), Sir Marmaduke in The Sorcerer (1966), Dick Deadeye in H.M.S. Pinafore (1960), the Pirate King in Pirates (1958 and 1968), Colonel Calverley in Patience (1961), Mountararat in Iolanthe (1960), Arac in Princess Ida (1955 and 1965), the Mikado in The Mikado (1958), Sir Roderic in Ruddigore (1962), Sergeant Meryll in Yeomen (1964), and King Paramount in Utopia Limited (1964 excerpts). He also appeared in the title role in D'Oyly Carte's 1966 film of The Mikado and as the voice of Sir Roderic Murgatroyd in the Halas and Batchelor cartoon version of Ruddigore.