The complete idiot's guide to classical music (30 page)

Beethoven, not generally known for considering other mortals his equal, let alone his superior, called George Frederic Handel (1685–1759) “the greatest of us all.” Not bad for the son of a valet and sometime barber at court.

The first time Handel packed up and left his native Germany, he headed for the sunnier climes of Italy, where he stayed for more than three years, composing secular cantatas in Florence, displaying his abilities as a virtuoso organist in Rome, and learning to write Italian-style operas in Venice.

Returning to Germany, he became Kapellmeister to the Elector of Hannover, but his heart (and quite often his body) was in London, which he visited on several occasions, and where his music was received with great enthusiasm. An amazing event settled Handel’s dilemma: For reasons too complicated to explain here, the Elector became King George I of England, and Handel followed him, bag, baggage and music paper, to live happily ever after in London. The new king, delighted to have somebody he could still speak German to, lavished a good salary and many other favors on the delighted composer; Handel, in turn, wrote the famous
Water Music Suite
so King George could barge up the Thames in high style.

After that, composer George and King George got along swimmingly, and when George II came along, Handel protected his investment by writing four coronation anthems. All the while, he was producing enormously popular (and financially rewarding) operas to Italian texts, and when public interest in them began to wane, he turned to writing the oratorios that elevated him into the pantheon of musical giants.

Much of Handel’s music was intended for the stage, so it has an outgoing quality, perhaps a little more accessible, less demanding, than that of Bach. Some experts characterize Bach as the introvert, Handel the extrovert; Bach may have had a sense of humor, but we know Handel did, even when he was the target. Once when a friend was complaining about the terrible piece he had heard at Vauxhall Gardens, Handel answered, “You are right, sir, it is very poor stuff. I thought so myself when I wrote it.”

Perhaps the crowning achievement of Handel’s life—certainly the work by which he is most often represented today—is
Messiah,
an oratorio he wrote in the incredibly short span of 24 days. We’ve all heard the great “Hallelujah Chorus”; Handel said that when he wrote it, “I saw all heaven before me, and the great God Himself.”

Handel conducted many more performances of the oratorio in the remaining 17 years of his life, and his last public appearance—just a week and a day before he died—was at yet another
Messiah
in London. As befitting an English hero, Handel was buried in Westminster Abbey.

 
Bet You Didn’t Know
When
Messiah
premiered in Dublin, there was such a crush for tickets that the ladies were asked to wear skirts without hoops and the gentlemen to leave their swords behind so that more people could fit into the hall. At the London premiere a year later, King George rose to his feet during the performance of the “Hallelujah Chorus,” prompting the rest of the listeners to follow suit and establishing the tradition of standing during this most thrilling of choral pieces.

Messiah
, of course, is an annual treat at Christmas and Easter, but a joy at any time of year. You can get further Bible lessons from a few other inspiring oratorios, such as
Saul
,
Judas Maccabaeus,
and
Israel in Egypt
. For shorter samplings of Handel’s choral writing, there are the Chandos and the Coronation Anthems.

History has not dealt too kindly with Handel’s Italian operas, so even though quite a few of them have been recorded, you might get a more comfortable sense of his Italianate leanings from the two great sets of Concerti Grossi (opus 3 and 6). He followed the lead of Corelli and Vivaldi here, yet gave the music his own special stamp of energy and good cheer.

Right behind
Messiah
in popularity are his two kingly commissions, the
Water Music
and
Royal Fireworks Music,
both of them bright, energetic and now encouragingly familiar.

Other instrumental pieces you’ll enjoy are the regal “Arrival of the Queen of Sheba” and the attractive keyboard suites, especially the one dubbed (not by Handel, though) “The Harmonious Blacksmith.”

Want more? There’s the charming Harp Concerto, the frisky D Major Harpsichord Concerto (though you may prefer it in one of the many piano recordings), and if you like the king of instruments, try a few of Handel’s 16 Concertos for Organ and Orchestra.

Antonio Vivaldi (1678–1741) was a fully ordained clergyman whose red hair earned him the nickname of “The Red Priest,” but he soon gave up the ministry for music (rumor had it that he’d stop right in the middle of a service if he thought of a good tune and wanted to write it down fast). Vivaldi’s music is noted for its clarity, color, and energetic rhythms, and boy, is there a lot of it. Off and on for more than 35 years, Vivaldi was music master at a school for orphaned girls in Venice, and the opportunity to compose pieces for all manner of unorthodox instrumental combinations obviously appealed to his experimental nature.

 
Bet You Didn’t Know
Concerts at the orphanage where Vivaldi worked became quite a fashionable event for the eligible bachelors (even a few ineligible ones) of Venice. “I vow to you,” wrote one smitten listener, “that there is nothing so diverting as a sight of a young and pretty nun in a white habit, with a bunch of pomegranate blossoms over her ear, conducting the orchestra with all the grace and precision imaginable.”

Soon Vivaldi became the undisputed concerto champion of the world. You name it, he wrote a concerto for it. He wrote flute, oboe, and cello concertos; he tossed off concertos for mandolin, clavier, piccolo, and guitar. He left nearly 40 bassoon concertos (he also wrote 40 operas, but that was in his spare time), and for his own instrument—the violin—the concerto total is up in the hundreds. When he got tired of the regular garden variety, Vivaldi came up with double, triple, and even quadruple concertos, usually issuing them in groups of 6 or 12 to help with the bookkeeping.

This is also true of his most popular work,
The Four Seasons,
which if you look closely, turns out to be separate violin concertos, the first four of the dozen in Vivaldi’s Opus 8. It’s hard to escape
The Four Seasons
nowadays: You’ll find it playing in coffee bars, in elevators, it even served as the background score and gave the title to the popular film starring Alan Alda. Listen carefully, though, and you’ll find it a marvelous example of descriptive music, with clever images of twittering birds, burbling brooks, snoozing shepherds, chattering teeth, horses at the hunt, and pelting hailstorms (not necessarily in that order).

 
Important Things to Know
It was his series of 12 Concerti Grossi, published in 1712 as his Opus 3, that first established Vivaldi’s fame. Bach was so impressed by the set that he proceeded to arrange half of them for other instruments. Vivaldi also had a passion for affixing picturesque subtitles to his works, but even when something went by the name of
The Hunt
,
Storm at Sea,
or
The Bullfinch,
it was still a concerto.

It’s hardly surprising—given his incredibly prolific output—that many Vivaldi pieces sound like many other Vivaldi pieces, so for the same money, start with
The Four Seasons.
Thereafter, make your concerto choices by your instrumental preferences, or take the easy way out and get one of the many recordings devoted to “Concertos for Diverse Instruments.”

 
Music Word
The
Magnificat
, named for the first word of the canticle of the Blessed Virgin Mary (“Magnificat anima mea Dominum,” Luke 1:46–55), is the most important hymn of the Vespers service in Roman Catholic liturgy. In Anglican churches, the Magnificat is part of the evening prayer, using the English words “My soul doth magnify the Lord.” Through the centuries, many composers have written Magnificats as separate choral pieces.

Vivaldi’s most popular choral work is the brilliant
Gloria in D
, and if that whets your vocal appetite, go on to his many other sacred works, including a pair of
Magnificats
, and several lovely settings of Biblical psalms.

Although Henry Purcell (1659–1695) is today recognized as one of the greatest native-born English composers, his star has been overshadowed by Handel, who lived twice as long and had infinitely more commercial success in London. Purcell wrote six operas to Handel’s nearly 40, spending much of his compositional time on shorter pieces: incidental music for plays, sacred songs and anthems, and a group of fantasias for strings.

 
Bet You Didn’t Know
Some of the stage plays that benefitted from Purcell’s songs and other incidental music sound like pips: The list includes
The Wives’ Excuse or Cuckolds Make Themselves
,
The Married Beau
,
Innocent Adultery
, and
The Virtuous Wife or Good Luck at Last
.