Composer, born in Halle, EC Germany. He was organist of Halle Cathedral at the age of 17, while also studying law, and worked as a violinist and keyboard player in the Hamburg opera orchestra (17036). In Italy (170610) he established a great reputation as a keyboard virtuoso, and had considerable success as an operatic composer. He was appointed in 1710 to the court of the Elector of Hanover (later George I of Great Britain). In 1720 he worked at the King's Theatre, London, where he produced a stream of operas, and then developed a new form, the English oratorio, which proved to be highly popular. After a stroke in 1737, he rallied, and afterwards wrote some of his most memorable work, such as Saul (1739), Israel in Egypt (1739), and Messiah (1742). His vast output included over 40 operas, about 20 oratorios, cantatas, sacred music, and orchestral, instrumental, and vocal works. He is buried in Poet's Corner, Westminster Abbey.
George Frideric Handel (23 February 1685 – 14 April 1759) was a German Baroque composer who was a leading composer of concerti grossi, operas and oratorios.
Biography
Handel was born at Halle in Saxony-Anhalt to Georg and Dorothea (née Dorothea Taust) Händel in 1685, the same year that both Johann Sebastian Bach and Domenico Scarlatti were born.
Nevertheless, the young Handel was permitted to take lessons in musical composition and keyboard techniques from Friedrich Wilhelm Zachau, the organist of the Liebfrauenkirche, Halle.
In 1702, in obedience to his father's wishes, he began the study of law at the University of Halle, but after his father's death the following year, he abandoned law for music, becoming the organist at the Protestant Cathedral. During the years 1707–1709 Handel traveled and studied in Italy. When opera was banned by local authorities, Handel found work as a composer of sacred music and wrote some pieces in operatic style.
In 1710 Handel became Kapellmeister to George, Elector of Hanover, who would soon be King George I of Great Britain. In 1726 Handel's opera Scipio (Scipione) was performed for the first time, the march from which remains the regimental slow march of the British Grenadier Guards.
In 1727 Handel was commissioned to write four anthems for the coronation ceremony of King George II. Handel was director of the Royal Academy of Music 1720–1728, and a partner of J. Handel also had a long association with the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, where many of his Italian operas were premiered. Handel gave up operatic management entirely in 1740, after he had lost a fortune in the business.
In April 1737, aged 52, he suffered a stroke or other injury which left his right arm temporarily paralysed and stopped him from performing.
In August, 1750, on a journey back from Germany to London, Handel was seriously injured in a carriage accident between The Hague and Haarlem in the Netherlands.
In 1751 he started turning blind, and by age 65 was completely blind in one eye. Handel never married, and kept his personal life very private.
Works
Handel's compositions include some fifty operas, twenty-three oratorios, and a large amount of church music, as well as instrumental pieces, such as the organ concerti of which there are sixteen, including the most famous, known as "The Cuckoo and the Nightingale", in which the birds can be heard calling back and forth to each other during passages played in different keys representing the vocal ranges of each of the two birds, the Opus 3 and 6 Concerti Grossi, the Water Music, and the Fireworks Music.
After his death, Handel's Italian operas fell into obscurity, save the odd fragment, such as the ubiquitous aria from Serse, "Ombra mai fu"; and Jephtha (1752).
Since the 1960s, with the revival of interest in baroque music and original instrument playing styles, interest has revived in Handel's Italian operas, and many have been recorded and performed onstage.
Also revived in recent years are a number of secular cantatas and what one might call secular oratorios or concert operas. For his secular oratorios, Handel turned to classical mythology for subjects, producing such works as Acis and Galatea (1719), Hercules (1745), and Semele (1744). In terms of musical style, particularly in the vocal writing for the English-language texts, these works have close kinship with the above-mentioned sacred oratorios, but they also share something of the lyrical and dramatic qualities of Handel's Italian operas. With the rediscovery of his theatrical works, Handel, in addition to his renown as instrumentalist, orchestral writer, and melodist, is now perceived as being one of opera's great musical dramatists.
Handel adopted the spelling "George Frideric Handel" on his naturalization as a British citizen.
Handel's works were edited by S.
Handel lived at 25 Brook Street, London from 1723 until his death in 1759, now commemorated by a blue plaque on the outside of the building. In 2000, the upper stories of 25 Brook Street were leased to the Handel House Trust, and, after an extensive restoration program, the Handel House Museum opened to the public on 8 November 2001.
Messiah was first performed in New Musick Hall in Fishamble Street, Dublin on 13 April, 1742, with 26 boys and five men from the combined choirs of St Patrick's and Christ Church cathedrals participating.
This article includes content derived from the public domain Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, 1914.
Media
Handel's Messiah, And the Glory of the Lord (file info) — play in browser (beta) Handel's Messiah, For unto us a child is born (file info) — play in browser (beta) Handel's Messiah, Hallelujah (file info) — play in browser (beta) Gigue - HWV 433 (file info) — play in browser (beta) Problems playing the files? See media help.Texts
See List of compositions by George Frideric Handel — text availability in listing &
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