Well, I’ve got egg on my face. How could I, who own practically two shelves full of his operas and oratorios, do a five hour radio show and not salute George Frideric Handel on his birthday? The sad fact of the matter is that my head is full of arcane composer birthdays, but Handel’s is not one of them. So I apologize, Georg. It’s not quite belated yet, but too late to give you the kind of gift you deserve.
I hope this overlaid saxophone quartet (with cute dogs) makes things better.
During these shortest days of the year, we can use all the light we can get. With four candles in the menorah last night, we’ll celebrate the third day of Hanukkah with a complete recording of Handel’s other holiday oratorio, “Judas Maccabaeus.” A complete performance of the piece will come your way this afternoon on WWFM, following today’s noontime concert.
Today’s midday broadcast will highlight the Brooklyn-based concert venue, National Sawdust. Included will be performances by the Chiara String Quartet, which has been stunning audiences with its performances of all six string quartets by Béla Bartók from memory, and the violinist Francesca Anderegg, a new music champion, who will perform Clint Needham’s “On the Road” and selections from Reinaldo Moya’s “Imagined Archipelago.”
After that, we’ll get a Handel on the Maccabees. What’s old is new, and what’s new is played as if it were standard repertoire, today between 12 and 4 p.m. EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and at wwfm.org.
Beethoven is remembered to have praised Handel on numerous occasions. “Handel is the greatest composer who ever lived,” he said. “I would uncover my head and kneel down on his tomb.” On his deathbed, he indicated an edition of Handel’s works and said, “There is the truth.”
Upon hearing the “Hallelujah Chorus,” Haydn wept and declared, “He is the master of us all.”
Mozart said, “He understands effect better than any of us – when he chooses, he strikes like a thunderbolt.”
Berlioz? Berlioz called him “a tub of pork and beer.” Knowing what I do of Handel, he probably would have enjoyed that best of all.
Happy birthday, George Frideric Handel (1685-1759).
“Ariodante” was the opera I hated most when I first heard it in 1990. Now I hold it dear. Funny how things change.
“Scherza infida”
“Dopo notte”
Hallelujah! Something different for a change.
Graduate students of Westminster Opera Theatre will be presenting Handel’s first oratorio, “Il trionfo del tempo e del disinganno” (“The Triumph of Time and Disillusionment”), in Italian with English supertitles, in two performances with orchestra, at Yvonne Theater, Rider University, in Lawrenceville, today and tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. A third, free performance will take place, with piano, Sunday at 4 p.m.
The oratorio will be staged as an opera, with the allegorical figures of Pleasure, Time and Truth in pursuit of Beauty.
Read more about it in my article in today’s Trenton Times.
http://www.nj.com/times-entertainment/index.ssf/2015/12/classical_music_westminster_op.html
PHOTOS: The young Handel with contemporaneous timepiece
“The British may not like music, but they absolutely love the noise it makes.”
Happy birthday, Sir Thomas Beecham (1879-1961)
More about Beecham here:
http://www.theguardian.com/friday_review/story/0,3605,468909,00.html
Beecham conducts Delius:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX5MLdxcTv4
Beecham conducts Berlioz:
Beecham conducts Handel (as arranged by Beecham):
Beecham conducts Sibelius:
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