George Frideric Handel, 1685-1759, achieved great fame during his life, traveled extensively and reaped sizable financial rewards. As a composer, Handel was prolific and excelled in every genre, especially opera and oratorio.
Handel was born in Halle, Germany to a middle class, non-musical family. He exhibited musical talent as a child but studied music in secret due to his father’s objections. A duke at the court where Handel’s father worked as a surgeon heard George play harpsichord and suggested he study formally. Thus, his father begrudgingly allowed the budding musician to study privately with a local church organist, excelling on organ, harpsichord and oboe.
At the age of twelve Handel composed impressive choral and instrumental works. His early success attracted attention and offers of patronage from the Court of Berlin, offers his father turned down in hopes of a law career for his son. Thus, Handel entered Halle University at seventeen, but despaired of his studies and, when his father passed, dropped out.
Hamburg
Determined to become an opera composer, Handel moved to the merchant city of Hamburg and worked as a violinist and harpsichordist in the Hamburg Opera House. After three years of toil—his first opera, Almira and Nero was a success while another failed—he left for Italy in 1706, hoping to further his operatic career.
Italy
Handel was invited to Italy by a Medici prince but soon had cardinals and princes as patrons. He had a keen sense of business and politics and quickly moved into the inner circle of Italian aristocrats and composers. He met the finest Italian composers of the day—Vivaldi, Corelli, and Scarlatti—and studied and toured with Alessandro Scarlatti (1660-1725), the greatest Italian opera composer of the late Baroque.
During his four years in Italy, he composed oratorios, cantatas, and Latin works for the Catholic Church and penned chamber music. Handel's opera Agrippina was staged twenty-seven times while living in Venice. Most significantly, he absorbed the essence of Italian music, especially opera, into his writing style.
The Charming Brute | Joseph Goupy, c.1680-1770 | A caricature of Handel depicting him as a vain and crude beast. | Fitzwilliam Museum
London
Returning to Germany in 1710 with fame and success, Handel assumed the prestigious position of music director at the Electoral Court of Hanover. In the same year he accepted a commission to write an opera in London and gained wide acclaim there with Rinaldo in 1711.
Handel returned to Germany but, scheming further productions, asked Elector Georg Ludwig for another leave of absence. It was granted on the condition he return to Germany within a reasonable amount of time.
During 1712, he staged four more successful operas in London and enjoyed the status of being England’s most popular composer. Queen Anne liked Handel so much she gave him a lifelong royal subsidy. In 1714, Queen Anne died without an English heir and her cousin, Elector Georg Ludwig, became King George I of England. King George wasn’t offended at Handel’s long absence and doubled his subsidy soon after his arrival.
Handel was a powerful and dominating musical figure in England, and formed an opera company in 1729, competing with local theaters. Jealousy among native musicians soon arose. After all, he was a foreigner who quickly moved into the forefront of the opera and the inner circle of the royal court. Hatred rose to the point that hoodlums were hired to rob and assault Handel’s audiences. Eventually the three rival opera companies—Handel’s company, the Royal Academy and the Opera of the Nobility—all closed by 1737.
Giulio Cesare in Egitto (Julius Caesar in Egypt), 1724 | George Frideric Handel | Title page from the first edition score published by Cluer | Wikimedia Commons
As Handel aged, he lead a more private life, practicing harpsichord, composing and attending church. He died in 1759 at the age of seventy-four. Three thousand people attended his funeral and burial at Westminster Abbey.
Chandos Portrait of George Frideric Handel | James Thornhill, 1675-1734 | The Fitzwilliam Museum
Handel excelled in every musical genre, but is best remembered today for his oratorio writing.
Oratorio
The oratorio is a multi-movement work similar to opera but with an emphasis on choir and Old Testament text, but lacking props and acting. Although usually set to a Biblical text, Handel's oratorios were intented to be performed on stages, not in church. We'll take a look at Handel's legendary oratorio, Messiah.
Bathsheba at Her Bath | Giuseppe Bartolomeo Chiari, 1654-1727 | Oratorios were often based on Old Testament scripture. | Metropolitan Museum of Art
Messiah
By the early 1740s, George Handel was heavily in debt due to a series of business failures. In 1741 a group of Dublin charities commissioned him to write music for a benefit concert to free men from debtors prison. This commission became the great oratorio, Messiah.
Composing Messiah
The composition of Messiah commenced August 22, 1741, and was completed on September 14, 1741, twenty-four days of nonstop work in the creation of two hundred-sixty pages of music. Handel rarely ate or slept during the writing of Messiah.
Messiah's Text
The scriptural text of Messiah was compiled by Charles Jennens and is mostly based on passages from the Old and New Testaments of the Bible. The text is structured to proclaim prophecies of Christ's nativity, passion, resurrection and, finally, his second coming and glorification in heaven.
Portrait of Charles Jennens, librettist for Messiah (c. 1740) | Thomas Hudson, 1701-79 | Handel House Museum
DublinDebut
Messiah's first performance in Dublin in 1741 was a success: the concert sold out in advance. Ladies were asked not to wear hoop dresses and men were implored to leave swords at home to make room for more people. The acceptance of Messiah in London was a little more rocky but by 1749 this great oratorio was on the road to becoming a staple of the repertoire.
Rehearsal of the Oratorio | William Hogarth, 1697-1764 | Hogarth was a 18th century London painter, engraver and satirist | Wikimedia Commons
With fifty-three movements, Messiah is a substantial work. The original was simply scored for SATB choir, vocal soloists, two trumpets, timpani, two oboes, two violins, viola and basso continuo. Many modern arrangements take considerable liberties, expanding the instrumentation to mammoth proportions.
Messiah: Hallelujah | Autograph draft score before orchestration | British Library (R.M.20.f.2, 103v)
Hallelujah Chorus
The famous Hallelujah Chorus is movement forty-four of the Messiah, concluding the second section of the work. The text for Hallelujah is knit together with passages from the book of Revelation:
Revelation 19:6: “Alleluia: for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth.”
Revelation 19:16: “And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, King of Kings, and Lord of Lords.”
Revelation 11:15: “And he shall reign for ever and ever.”
Here are the complete lyrics for the Hallelujah chorus:
For the lord God omnipotent reigneth
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
For the lord God omnipotent reigneth
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
For the lord God omnipotent reigneth
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
(For the lord God omnipotent reigneth)
Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah
For the lord God omnipotent reigneth
(Hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah hallelujah)
Hallelujah
The kingdom of this world;
is become
the kingdom of our Lord,
and of His Christ
and of His Christ
And He shall reign for ever and ever
And he shall reign forever and ever
And he shall reign forever and ever
And he shall reign forever and ever
King of kings forever and ever hallelujah hallelujah
and lord of lords forever and ever hallelujah hallelujah
King of kings forever and ever hallelujah hallelujah
and lord of lords forever and ever hallelujah hallelujah
King of kings forever and ever hallelujah hallelujah
and lord of lords
King of kings and lord of lords
And he shall reign
And he shall reign
And he shall reign
He shall reign
And he shall reign forever and ever
King of kings forever and ever
and lord of lords hallelujah hallelujah
And he shall reign forever and ever
King of kings and lord of lords
King of kings and lord of lords
And he shall reign forever and ever
Forever and ever and ever and ever
(King of kings and lord of lords)
The structure of the Hallelujah Chorus is based on a sectional form. Each section is delineated by changes in texture, shifting between homophonic, monophonic and polyphonic textures for dramatic effect. For example, the text, "Hallelujah," is presented in homophonic texture near the beginning. The text, "For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth" is rendered with a dramatic shift to monophonic texture. In other words, the choir and orchestra perform the same melodic line without harmony or counterpoint.
Hallelujah Chorus from Messiah | George Frideric Handel (4:22). A religious advertisement starts at 4:23, so stop the video at that point.
Water Music Suite
Handel's oratorios often garner the most attention and, thus, it's easy to forget he was a prolific composer of instrumental music and an accomplished keyboard performer.
Westminster Bridge, with the Lord Mayor's Procession on the Thames | Giovanni Antonio Canal (Canaletto) c. 1747 | Yale Center for British Art
King George's Party
The Water Music Suite was written for King George’s boating party on the River Thames on July 17, 1717. There are twenty-one movements scored for flute, two oboes, bassoon, two horns, two trumpets, strings and basso continuo. Here’s what the London Daily Courant, July 19, 1717, wrote about it:
On Wednesday evening about eight, the King took water of Whitefall in an open barge. Many other barges with persons of quality attended, and so great was the number of boats that the whole river was covered. A city company’s barge was employed for the music composed for this occasion by Mr. Handel: which his Majesty liked so well that he caused it to be played three times over in going and returning.
The King's big shindig helped propel Water Music to major hit status and, indeed, Water Music is still popular three hundred years later and among Handel's best known instrumental works.
Alla HornpipefromWater Music | George Frideric Handel (3:08)
Air from Water Music | George Frideric Handel (3:20)
The Enraged Musician (1741) | William Hogarth | London street musicians disturbing the rehearsal of a concert violinist. | Wikipedia Commons
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Messiah 
Composing Messiah
Dublin Debut
Hallelujah Chorus
Water Music Suite 
