Change brings in tenor in excellent piece by Gilbert and Sullivan (8)
I believe the answer is:
patience
'piece by gilbert and sullivan' is the definition.
I can't tell whether this definition defines the answer.
'change brings in tenor in excellent' is the wordplay.
'change' becomes 'pence' (as in small change coins).
'brings in' indicates putting letters inside.
'tenor' becomes 't'.
'in' is an insertion indicator.
'excellent' becomes 'ai' (resembles 'Ap', old-fashioned term for excellent).
't' put into 'ai' is 'ati'.
'pence' enclosing 'ati' is 'PATIENCE'.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for patience that I've seen before include "Calm endurance as in card game for one" , "Card game played by one person" , "show" , "likely to be lost by the hot-tempered" , "Gilbert and Sullivan work" .)