Handel and his patrons
Although George Frideric Handel was born in 1685 in Halle an der Saale, he is now admired above all as an English composer. What might it have been like for him when he first went to London in 1710 and began to build an existence for himself? Of course, he was very well connected. In Hanover, he was in the service of the future King of Great Britain – a fact that will certainly have opened many doors for him. Follow our author Jan-Geert Wolff on on Handel’s footsteps in London.
George Frideric Handel is admired above all as an English composer. But he was a cosmopolitan. He travelled with enthusiasm throughout Europe and lived in several different cities. In 1702, following the wishes of his father, who had died five years earlier, he began studying law, something which was not that unusual for musical careers at that time, if we think of his friend Georg Philipp Telemann. But as with Telemann, music got in the way of a legal career. Handel initially became organist at the Domkirche in Halle. In 1703 he settled in Hamburg for three years, and in 1706 travelled to Italy, where he was dubbed “il Sassone”, the Saxon. Four years later he returned to Germany, to the court in Hanover, where he became Kapellmeister.
London
But the desire to travel remained in his blood. In autumn 1710 Handel travelled to London where he met the opera impresario John Heidegger, who staged the richly melodic opera “Rinaldo” in 1711 at the Queen’s Theatre – a work which includes the famous sarabande aria “Lascia ch’io pianga”. Handel’s combination of the Italian operatic tradition of Scarlatti with the French style of Lully was to become one of his greatest successes.
As Henning Bey writes in the booklet of the Carus recording of the “Utrecht Te Deum & Jubilate” (Carus 83.310), these journeys to England had more than just an artistic purpose: as a Hanoverian court official, Handel was to report to his electoral employer at first hand about the health of the ailing Queen Anne. In 1714, thanks to the Act of Settlement, Georg Ludwig succeeded Queen Anne as George I, King of Great Britain, and thus his former court Kapellmeister came to the British Isles. Two years earlier, Handel had moved completely to London, and in 1727 he also took British citizenship. After Handel performed the Water Music on the Thames in 1717, he became ‘Composer of Musick’ to the Chapel Royal too.
Audio sample:
Utrechter Te Deum – We praise thee o god
Utrechter Te Deum – The glorious Company
Utrechter Te Deum & Jubilate
CD Carus 83.310
Solisten, Gaechinger Cantorey, Hans-Christoph Rademann
Titel page of the Teseo libretto, London 1713
Studies, Compositions and the British Crown
In the first years in his newly-adopted country, the composer devoted himself first and foremost to studying the English language, music, and culture. He also composed constantly. In January 1713 his opera “Teseo” was premiered. And when the War of the Spanish Succession finally ended in November that year, Handel composed the “Utrecht Te Deum” and a “Jubilate” for the celebrations of the impending Peace Treaty between England and France. Both works were premiered in St Paul’s Cathedral and, as Henning Bey says, they “elevated Handel to the rank of a state composer of the crown”. Incidentally this carried with it an annual pension of 200 pounds for life promised by the Queen. George I later doubled this amount and also employed Handel as music teacher to his daughters.
Handel initially spent some months at the house of Henry Andrews, a well-off art lover in Barn Elms, present-day Barnes in the county of Surrey near London. According to information from his future copyist John Christopher Smith (the son of Handel’s university friend Johann Christoph Schmidt, who moved to London with him to be his secretary, bookkeeper, and assistant there), the composer commuted between this residence and his patron’s town house. London was where the Scriblerus Club was found, an association of politically active writers, including Queen Anne’s personal physician John Arbuthnot, and Richard Boyle; between 1713 and 1716 Handel and Arbuthnot resided at Boyle’s Burlington House in Piccadilly. Their host was the 3rd Earl of Burlington, a patron of the arts who was involved in the London opera scene in his younger years, to whom Handel dedicated three operas in thanks for his hospitality. From 1717 to 1719 Handel moved to stay with the Duke of Chandos at Cannons as resident composer. There he also wrote a “Te Deum” and the “Chandos Anthems”.
Connections
Handel was extremely well-connected. He quickly established artistic and social contacts at the Queen’s Theatre, designed by John Vanbrugh. He also frequented the London Kit-Cat Club, whose members supported the strengthening of parliament’s powers and the restriction of the monarchy’s. It is very probable that Handel came into contact with other members at the Queen’s Theatre, even though he avoided adopting a personal political stance between the different factions. At any rate, the “Utrecht Te Deum” hailed the conclusion of the peace treaty. An interesting political detail worth mentioning: the treaty was rejected by Georg Ludwig when he was Electoral Prince as it conflicted with the interests of his court; but as the British King George I he naturally ratified it.
Audio sample:
Chorus: And the glory of the Lord
Chorus: Behold the Lamb of God
Georg Friedrich Händel:
Messiah
CD Carus 83.219
Solisten, Kammerchor Stuttgart, Barockorchester Stuttgart, Frieder Bernius
In 1719 Handel became one of the musical directors of the newly-founded Royal Academy of Music, a position he held until 1728. In the meantime he had moved, and now lived permanently at 25 Brook Street in London’s Mayfair district where a museum now exists. This is where he lived and worked until his death in 1759, and where he composed numerous operas and oratorios, as well as the Music for the Royal Fireworks (HWV 351). The exhibits in the museum include harpsichords, a clavichord, and a house organ. Stefan Zweig described vividly how it looked and what it was like in 1741 in his novel “Georg Friedrich Händels Auferstehung” (English version, “The Lord gave the Word”), in which he gave an account of the composition of “Messiah” (Carus 83.219). The chorus “Since by man came death”, which you can listen to here, illustrates an extreme change in dynamics and agogics, clearly based on the text, a stylistic means which Handel greatly valued, and one which he had used earlier in 1713 in the “Utrecht Te Deum”.
Utrecht Te Deum
Utrecht Jubilate
CD Utrecht De Deum & Jubilate
The Gaechinger Cantorey, conducted by Hans-Christoph Rademann, performed the Te Deum & Jubilate at the brilliant closing concert of the Musikfest Stuttgart 2018.
Messiah
Messiah - a refelction by Helmuth Rilling
Messiah. Understanding and Performing Handel’s Masterpiece
This book on Handel’s Messiah reflects Helmuth Rilling’s remarkable skills, both as a conductor and as an educator.
Messiah - CD with Kammerchor Stuttgart and Frieder Bernius
Practice Aid Carus Choir Coach
Performers: Carolyn Sampson (soprano), Daniel Taylor (alto), Benjamin Hulett (tenore), Peter Harvey (basso) – Kammerchor Stuttgart, Barockorchester Stuttgart – Frieder Bernius
Choral collection Haendel
Hallelujah
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