Kenneth Sandford

English actor and singer

Kenneth Sandford (28 June 1924 – 19 September 2004) was an English singer and actor, best known for his performances in baritone roles of the Savoy Operas of Gilbert and Sullivan. After service the Royal Air Force during World War II, Sandford turned away from a career in art and studied singing. He performed in musical theatre in the West End and on tour between 1950 and 1956, including 800 performances starring in a revue called Jokers Wild with The Crazy Gang. He also began a concert career. In 1957, he was engaged by the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company and immediately began to perform eight principal roles in repertory, including Pooh Bah in The Mikado. He remained with the company for 25 years until it closed, also making about twenty recordings with the company, and several recordings for Reader's Digest and others. In later years, Sandford continued to tour in and direct Gilbert and Sullivan productions, often with his former D'Oyly Carte colleague Roberta Morrell. After The International Gilbert and Sullivan Festival was established in 1994, he often performed and lectured for the festival's audiences and held master classes for its performers.

Kenneth Sandford was born Kenneth Parkin in Godalming, Surrey and raised in Sheffield, where his father became landlord of a pub. Sandford hoped to be an artist, studying painting at the College of Arts and Crafts in Sheffield, where he won a scholarship to the Royal College of Art in London. After he returned from service in the Royal Air Force during World War II, he attended that college, but he took up singing and became intrigued by the theatre. He began to perform in musicals, concerts and oratorios and switched to opera school. Sandford played roles in several shows in the West End and on tour between 1950 and 1956, including Carousel at the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane (1950–51) (understudying and appearing as Billy Bigelow); on tour as Count Igor Staniev in King's Rhapsody; as Sandy Twist in Paint Your Wagon at His Majesty's Theatre (1953–54); in Kismet (understudying and going on for Alfred Drake) and 800 performances starring in a revue called Jokers Wild with The Crazy Gang at Victoria Palace Theatre (1954–56). He also sang in concert as a tenor during this period, including a Wigmore Hall recital in April 1951 in songs by composers as diverse as Wolf Ferrari, Rachmaninoff and Medtner. In 1952, he married Pauline Joyce, and the couple had a son and a daughter.

Sandford joined the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company in 1957, for the pay of £37 and 10 shillings a week (about £700 at 2007 values) He immediately assumed eight principal baritone roles: the Sergeant of Police in The Pirates of Penzance, Archibald Grosvenor in Patience, Private Willis in Iolanthe, King Hildebrand in Princess Ida, Pooh Bah in The Mikado, Sir Despard Murgatroyd in Ruddigore, Wilfred Shadbolt in The Yeomen of the Guard, and Don Alhambra del Bolero in The Gondoliers. By this time, the copyrights on Gilbert and Sullivan had expired and, to Sandford's delight, Besch's production was completely restaged, allowing Sandford to develop a new interpretation of the role. Sandford had been invited to join the company of the Glyndebourne Festival in 1961, but with a young family to support he felt he could not abandon the security offered by his D'Oyly Carte contract, and thereafter "it was never the right time or the right financial deal to lure him." Sandford sometimes bridled at the D'Oyly Carte directorial "traditions". He was originally trained in his roles by Eleanor Evans (Mrs. Darrell Fancourt), then the company's stage director. Sandford later recalled,

For the 1975 D'Oyly Carte centenary season, Sandford played all his principal baritone roles as well as King Paramount in the company's first revival of Utopia, Limited since the original production. Andrew Lamb, writing in The Musical Times, thought him "outstanding" in the role. Sandford sang Ludwig in a concert performance of The Grand Duke in the same season. In addition, during that season, Trial by Jury was preceded by an original short play, Dramatic Licence by William Douglas Home, in which Gilbert, Sullivan and Richard D'Oyly Carte plan the birth of Trial in 1875. Sandford played W. S. Gilbert in the playlet. and along with his friend and former D'Oyly Carte colleague Roberta Morrell, he appeared in and co directed several Savoy Operas at Gawsworth Hall, Cheshire. Sandford toured North America several times with Geoffrey Shovelton, John Ayldon, Lorraine Daniels and others in a series of Gilbert and Sullivan concerts entitled "The Best of Gilbert & Sullivan", In 1999 he co operated with Roberta Morrell in the writing of a book, Merely Corroborative Detail, published in 1999, which combined his biography with detailed notes on the interpretation of his D'Oyly Carte roles. Sandford died at Market Drayton, Shropshire at the age of 80. He also recorded several parts with the company that he never performed with them on stage (although in subsequent years he performed some of them): Counsel for the Plaintiff in Trial by Jury (1964); Usher in Trial (1975); Phantis and Lord Dramaleigh in a recording of Utopia excerpts (1964), and Thomas Brown in The Zoo (1978), making about twenty recordings in all for the company. and he was the voice of Sir Despard in the 1967 Halas & Batchelor Ruddigore cartoon.