Kathie’s Aria

“Chips, darling, it’s started,” also known as “Kathie’s Aria,” is an excerpt for soprano from Gordon Getty’s opera Goodbye, Mr. Chips (based on the novella by James Hilton). The aria is sung by the good-hearted wife of the titular English school teacher from her hospital bed. She is calm and compassionate as she faces what she intimates may be the life-threatening delivery of their child. She tells Chips that, should the worst happen, he must continue to teach his students “so that they will learn to teach themselves, and teach the world.” As Chips is led out by the nurses, she assures him that she’ll always be with him and will love him “forever and ever and ever.”