Edward Solomon

Edward Solomon (25 July 1855 – 22 January 1895) was a prolific English composer, as well as a conductor, orchestrator and pianist. He died at age 39 by which time he had written dozens of works produced for the stage, including several for the D'Oyly Carte Opera Company, including The Nautch Girl (1891). Early in his career, he was a frequent collaborator of Henry Pottinger Stephens. He had a bigamous marriage with Lillian Russell in the 1880s.

Edward ("Teddy") Solomon was born in Lambeth, London, to a Jewish family. He had ten siblings. His parents were Charles Solomon (1817–1890), a music hall pianist, conductor and composer, and his wife, Cesira "Sarah" Marinina, née Mirandoli (1834–1891). He picked up music by working with his father.

Aged 17 or 18, Solomon married 15-year-old Jane Isaacs in 1873, and the two had a daughter, Claire Romaine (1873–1964), who became an actress, but Solomon soon deserted Isaacs and, over the years, took a series of mistresses. Isaacs later sang under the stage name Lily Grey.

His first comic opera was A Will With a Vengeance (1876), a one-act work with a libretto by Frederick Hay, based on La Vendetta. This was produced at the Globe Theatre. In 1879, he met Henry Pottinger "Pot" Stephens while he was the musical director at the Royalty Theatre conducting, among other works, Arthur Sullivan's The Zoo. With Stephens, he produced his first successes, Billee Taylor (1880), a "nautical comedy opera" in two acts; and Claude Duval (1881, celebrating a well known 18th century highwayman), both of which remained popular for many years in both the UK and US. Other Solomon and Stephens pieces were Lord Bateman, or Picotee's Pledge (1882), Virginia and Paul, or Ringing the Changes (1883) and later The Red Hussar (1889), a "comedy opera" in three acts. Together, they would also write Popsy Wopsy, a "musical absurdity" (1880) and Pocahontas (1884).

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