Baroque Composer

George Frideric Handel

George Frideric Handel (1685-1759), a master of Italian opera and English oratorio, was born one month before JS Bach in Halle, Germany. He was not from a musical family -his father wanted him to study law but by the time he was nine, his musical talent was so outstanding that he was allowed to study with a local organist and composer. By eleven, he was able to compose and give lessons, At 18, he set out to Hamburg where he was drawn to the renowned opera house and he became a violinist and harpsichordist in the orchestra. When he was twenty, one of his successful opera was produced.

At twenty-one, Handel went to Italy; there he wrote widely acclaimed operas and mingled with princes, cardinals, and famous musicians. Returning to Germany in 1710, he took a well-paid position as music director for Elector.George Ludwig of Hannover, Germany, where he arrived in the spring of 1710. He did not hold this job for long. By the end of 1710 Handel had left for London, where with Rinaldo (1711), he once again scored an operatic triumph. After returning to Hannover he was granted permission for a second, short trip to London, but he never returned. Handel was forced to face his truancy when in 1714 the elector at Hannover, his former employer, became King George I of England. The reconciliation of these two men occurred during a royal party on the River Thames in 1715, during which the F major suite from Handel's Water Music was probably played. Under the patronage of the duke of Chandos, he composed his oratorio Esther and the 11 Chandos anthems for choir and string orchestra (1717-20). By 1719, Handel had won the support of the king to start the Royal Academy of Music for performances of opera, which presented some of Handel's greatest operas: Radamisto (1720), Giulio Cesare (1724), Tamerlano (1724), and Rodelinda (1725). In 1727 Handel became a naturalised British subject; in 1728 the academy collapsed. He formed a new company the following year. Forced to move to another theater by the Opera of the Nobility, a rival company, in 1734, he continued to produce opera until 1737, when both houses failed. Handel suffered a stroke and retired to Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle) to recuperate

His Oratorios:

In 1738 Handel began another operatic endeavor, which ended with his last opera, Deidamia, in 1741. During the 1730s, however, the most important directions taken by Handel were, first, the composition of English dramatic oratorios, Athalia (1733) and Saul (1739); and, second, the surge of instrumental music used in collaboration with the oratorios, including some of Handel's greatest concertos—the solo concertos of op. 4 (1736, five for organ and one for harp) and the 12 concerti grossi of op. 6 (1739). In 1742 Messiah, the work for which he is best known, was first performed in Dublin. Handel continued composing oratorios at the rate of about two a year, including such masterworks as Samson (1743) and Solomon (1749), until 1751, when his eyesight began to fail. Handel died in London on April 14, 1759; the last musical performance he heard, on April 6, was of his own Messiah

His Legacy:

Throughout his life Handel avoided the contrapuntal techniques of his contemporary Johann Sebastian Bach and achieved his effects through the simplest of means, trusting his own innate musicianship. The music of both composers, however, sums up the age in which they lived. After them, opera took a different path; the favorite baroque genres of chamber and orchestral music, trio sonata and concerto grosso, were largely abandoned; and the development of the symphony orchestra and the piano led into realms uncharted by the baroque masters. Thus, their influence cannot be found in specific examples. Handel's legacy lies in the dramatic power and lyrical beauty inherent in all his music. His operas move from the rigid use of conventional schemes toward a more flexible and dramatic treatment of recitatives, ariosos, arias, and chorus. His ability to build large scenes around a single character was further extended in the dramatic scenas of composers such as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and the Italian Gioacchino Rossini. Handel's greatest gift to posterity was undoubtedly the creation of the dramatic oratorio genre, partly out of existing operatic traditions and partly by force of his own musical imagination; without question, the oratorios of both the Austrian composer Joseph Haydn and the German composer Felix Mendelssohn owe a large debt to those of Handel. He was one of the first composers to have a biography written of him (1760), to have centennial celebrations of his birth (1784-86), and to have a complete edition of his music published (40 vol., 1787-97)—Ludwig van Beethoven cherished his set. Although today, as in the 19th century, Handel is best known for only a few of his works, such as Water Music and Messiah, more and more attempts are being made to bring his other compositions, especially his operas, before the public. Handel's rich and unique musical genius deserves to be remembered in the extraordinary fullness of its entirety.