Pocket Opera North Beach, through nearly two decades of presenting a weekly chamber music series (1960-1978) at the Old Spaghetti Factory, to his present-day fame as the creator of one of San Francisco's most popular operatic institutions. Pippin's first translation came in 1968, in the course of preparing Mozart's one-act opera "Bastien und Bastienne" for performance as part of his chamber music series. The opera, and his singing translation of it, were immediate successes with San Francisco audiences. From that point on, Pippin has dedicated himself to the task of producing literate English versions of both well-loved classics and lesser-known gems of
D'Oyly Carte Opera Company popular Offenbach operetta "La Périchole" he brought W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan together. On tour in 1871, Carte had conducted Arthur Sullivan's one-act comic opera "Cox and Box", which received an 1874 London revival. In 1873, W. S. Gilbert had offered a libretto to Carte about an English courtroom, but at the time Carte knew of no composer available to set it to music. Carte remembered Gilbert's libretto and suggested to Gilbert that Sullivan write the music for a one-act comic opera, "Trial by Jury", which was quickly composed and added to the Royalty's bill in March 1875. The