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QuickTake:
Day Schual, a 17-year-old home-schooled Eugene girl, was the only person to take on the challenge of a Eugene Opera contest: perform a verse of the famously difficult song “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General.”
As Eugene Opera prepared for its production of “The Pirates of Penzance,” the company held a competition to see who could do the best version of “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General.” It’s the mother of all patter songs, fast-paced tunes packed with multisyllabic turns of phrase that are staples of musical theater.
Only one person entered: a Eugene 17-year-old with a passion for patter songs.
“It was kind of like a dream come true,” said Day Schual. “It’s like, here’s my thing, right there in front of me. I would be sad if I didn’t take that opportunity.”
Schual jumped into theater when she and her siblings started home-school during the COVID-19 pandemic. Her mother, Sky, organizes the curriculum, and she assigned oral reports that were essentially acting exercises. Soon the Schual kids were doing shows for family and friends.
That included “The Pirates of Penzance,” which premiered in 1879 and was written by the dramatist W.S. Gilbert and composer Arthur Sullivan. When Schual watched the 1983 movie version, the major-general’s song — the most difficult song in the show — called to her.
She wanted to memorize the patter before a family poetry night. She gathered props and a general costume, and drafted her cousin and brother to be the chorus.
The general costume came in handy for her Eugene Opera contest entry. But there’s one drawback: Her family keeps calling her the general. (She also used the costume for a family version of “Hamilton,” in which she played George Washington.)
We asked Schual to come into the Lookout office to record a version of the opening verse.
A 19th-century satire on the over-education of British military officers, “I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General” may not appeal to many teenagers in 2025. But for Schual, the challenge was appealing.
“The speed is fun,” she said. “I like enunciation, and how precise everything has to be.”
For the Eugene Opera contest, entrants could choose one of two verses in the song to submit. Schual decided to challenge herself by going with the lesser-known second verse, which includes tongue-twisters like “I quote in elegiacs all the crimes of Heliogabalus / In conics I can floor peculiarities parabolus.”
As her reward for winning the contest, Schual received free tickets to see the Eugene Opera production as well as a backstage tour and invitation to watch a final dress rehearsal. She said she’s not considering pursuing the stage as a career but wants to continue in amateur acting in the years to come.
She already has her next project lined up.
Another Gilbert and Sullivan patter song, “My Eyes Are Fully Open” in the opera “Ruddigore,” is also a favorite of hers. But her rapid singing interests aren’t specific to centuries-old British comic operas.
“If there’s one thing I like more than Gilbert and Sullivan, it would be ‘The Music Man,’ by Meredith Willson,” she said.
That musical’s famous patter song, “Ya Got Trouble,” is on her list to memorize.
“I just printed it out yesterday,” she said.
