WITH new voices in the chorus, a set worth thousands, and a professional director who has been treading the boards for nearly 30 years, the forthcoming production of The Merry Widow by Hereford Gilbert & Sullivan Operatic Society looks sure to dazzle.

Highlights include music by Franz Lehar - "some of the finest waltz music since Johann Strauss", the dancing - six local dancers have been recruited from Hereford Dance Studios - and a racy 1900s plot.

"It's a step-up from G&S," says director Martyn Harrison. "You have to remember that it is written nearly half-a-century later. It's something that you don't see performed that often. It raises the standard."

Martyn, who has played a lead in The Merry Widow over a dozen times, and directed it on six occasions, is back for his fourth sojourn with the Hereford company.

Based in Basildon, Essex, he is also a freelance tenor. He has worked for the big names (Sir Peter Hall, Sir Trevor Nunn) and appeared in The Phantom of the Opera in London's West End in the early '90s.

He is as excited about his month in the country as he is about any of this.

The Merry Widow is a great story of love in a Pontevedrian setting. Two love triangles chime in tandem; with lovers, secret and spurned, diving in and out of summerhouses and the fate of a small independent state relying on the affairs of a young wealthy widow. A tale of romance rekindled against a backdrop of embassy and nightclub action.

"Over two-and-a-half hours it comes out quite well!" said Martyn.

The cast of 50 is in intensive rehearsal for the March 2 opening.

With Martyn, travels his wife - Audrey - also a singer. Her experience spans costume and make-up and she acts as a valuable sounding board for him.

"If Audrey says I can't do something - that's when I put it in!" he said.

On this occasion she is also lending the all-important swan's feather fan - behind which secret assignations can be fixed, and marriages mended.

The Merry Widow plays at Hereford Courtyard from March 2-6. To book call 01432 359252.