"Handel says he will not be undertaking any projects next winter, but I hope to persuade him to set to music a new collection of biblical texts that I have compiled for him, and to perform them himself during Passion Week. I hope he will devote all his genius and skill to it, so that the composition will surpass all his earlier works, just as the subject surpasses any other subject. The subject is Messiah."
Handel’s Messiah: notes
Handel’s *Messiah* is a masterpiece that pushes the boundaries of musical expression
Handel’s *Messiah* is a masterpiece that pushes the boundaries of musical expression: it is more than just an ingeniously composed oratorio – it is a universal story of hope, joy and redemption. No wonder that, after nearly three centuries, it remains immensely popular and has become a true Christmas classic.
Premiere
On 13 April 1742, around a thousand people were queuing outside The Great Music Hall in Dublin. The hall was packed to the rafters, whilst outside hundreds more audience members waited in vain for a place. The scene was reminiscent of scenes closer to home, where festival-goers or concert-goers are forced to watch their favourite artist’s performance on a screen due to the limited capacity of a venue. Technology had not yet advanced that far in the time of George Frideric Handel (1685–1759). For the premiere of his Messiah (HWV 56), the audience were asked not to wear hoop skirts or bring swords, so that as many people as possible could attend the concert.
Yet the road to that success was not without its hurdles. Handel composed his Messiah at the lowest point of his career, and although the performance in Dublin was a resounding success, it took almost ten years for the London public to embrace Messiah as well.
Rebirth
Throughout his career, Handel proved to have a keen eye for making the right connections. As a young man, his talent took him from his hometown of Halle to Hamburg, a prosperous and thriving city, where he composed several successful operas. Encouraged by Prince Ferdinando de’ Medici, he travelled to Italy, the cradle of opera, not long afterwards. There, too, he quickly gained access to the higher echelons of the nobility. An important meeting with Prince Ernst August of Hanover led him to the German city of the same name. In Hanover, he was appointed Kapellmeister and breathed new life into the musical scene, before settling permanently in England in 1717.
Handel remained in London for some forty years, where he introduced the public to Italian opera – initially with great success. However, around 1730, the English public’s interest in opera began to wane, and so he turned his attention to the oratorio, a genre he had already experimented with in Rome when opera had been banned there. The English oratorio offered several advantages: the libretto in the native language made the genre accessible to a wider audience and enabled Handel to call upon local singers. Moreover, expensive sets were no longer required. Yet these remained difficult years: health problems plagued Handel, and due to the lack of success of his latest operas and oratorios, he was virtually bankrupt. Dejected, he withdrew in February 1741 and did not compose anything for a long time. Until the fabulously wealthy Charles Jennens – who had written the libretto for his oratorio *Saul* a few years earlier – came forward with a new libretto.
Hallelujah!
For the Lord God Almighty reigns.
Hallelujah!
The Kingdom of this world has become the Kingdom of our Lord
and of His Christ;
And He shall reign for ever and ever,
King of Kings and Lord of Lords!
And He shall reign for ever and ever.
Hallelujah! Halleluja!
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Hallelujah!
For the Lord, our God, the Almighty, has assumed the kingship.
The kingship over the world has come to our Lord
Hallelujah!
and to his Anointed One
and He shall reign as King for ever and ever.
King of kings and Lord of lords!
And He shall reign as King for ever and ever.
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Messiah
Jennens’ text reignited Handel’s creative fervour: in a burst of inspiration, he composed the music for *Messiah* in barely a month. However, it was still some time before the work was first performed. It was only when Handel was invited to a series of charity concerts in Dublin in March 1742 that he dared to perform his new composition live in front of an audience. In the Irish capital, he was welcomed like a superstar; all the concerts sold out in no time at all. Interest was particularly high for the premiere of his new ‘Grand Oratorio’. So great, in fact, that some members of the audience were still queuing outside during the performance, hoping to catch at least a glimpse of the spectacle. The premiere of *Messiah* on 13 April 1742 also garnered unanimous praise from the press:
“Mr Handel presented his first oratorio [...] which was attended by a larger and more refined audience than had ever been seen on a similar occasion. The performance surpassed anything else in this Kingdom.”
“The sublime, the grand and the tender, set to the most exalted, solemn and moving words, combined to transport and enchant the delighted heart and ear.”
Hallelujah!
As enthusiastic as the reception for *Messiah* was in Dublin, so lukewarm was the reaction in London. Even before the planned concert at Covent Garden on 23 March 1743, a whole debate arose over the suitability of that venue for the performance of this ‘Act of Religion’. Many considered Messiah ‘too exalted to be performed in a theatre, especially by secular singers’. And although Handel had tried to pre-empt the controversy by describing the work as A New Sacred Oratorio, even that proved to no avail.
Much of this, of course, had to do with the text of the oratorio, which on this occasion was not entirely new but consisted of a collection of biblical verses. The coming, suffering and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the Messiah, are celebrated in three parts. Both this three-part structure and the musical approach were in keeping with Handel’s earlier operas. Messiah, too, features virtuoso arias, stirring choral passages – the most famous example being the ‘Hallelujah’ at the end of the second part – and a similar dramatic structure. What sets *Messiah* apart from Handel’s other oratorios is the absence of a clear, narrative structure; this lends the work a more contemplative nature. Handel was all too aware of the power his music could wield. For instance, he responded to a compliment following a performance of Messiah as follows: ‘I would regret it if I had merely entertained the audience; I want to make them better people.’
It took nearly ten years before the London public, too, welcomed *Messiah* with applause. The controversy only really subsided when Handel began performing the work annually at his benefit concerts for London’s Foundling Hospital. And although he originally composed the work for Easter, it was increasingly performed around Christmas time. Various versions of *Messiah* followed – Handel had to adapt it regularly to suit the performers available – and even after his death, the work underwent a few more transformations. Mozart, for instance, wrote a version for a classical orchestra, adding clarinets and brass instruments, and setting it to a German libretto. Not to improve upon the Baroque master, “for Handel knows better than anyone what works. When he makes a choice, he strikes like a bolt of lightning.”
Aurélie Walschaert