George Frideric Handel
German-British Baroque master of oratorio, opera and ceremonial music
1685
1759
German-British
Baroque
Messiah, Water Music, Music for the Royal Fireworks
Early life
George Frideric Handel was born on 23 February 1685 in Halle, in the Duchy of Magdeburg. His father, a barber-surgeon, was initially reluctant to allow a musical career, but relented after the Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels heard the boy play and urged proper training. Handel studied with Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow, organist at Halle's Marktkirche, who gave him a thorough grounding in keyboard playing, counterpoint, and the music of German and Italian masters. In 1703 Handel moved to Hamburg, where he played violin in the opera orchestra and composed his first operas, before travelling to Italy in 1706 to immerse himself in the Italian style. His Italian years (1706–1710) produced the operas Agrippina, Rodrigo, and a series of brilliant cantatas and oratorios that established his reputation across the peninsula.
Career and major works
After a brief appointment as Kapellmeister in Hanover, Handel settled permanently in London in 1712, where he would dominate English musical life for nearly five decades. He composed over forty Italian operas for the London stage, including Giulio Cesare (1724), Rodelinda (1725), and Alcina (1735). When public taste turned against Italian opera in the late 1730s, Handel reinvented himself as a composer of English oratorios, producing Saul (1739), Israel in Egypt (1739), and his most celebrated work, Messiah (1741), whose 'Hallelujah' chorus remains one of the best-known pieces of music in the world. Other major works include the Water Music (1717), the Music for the Royal Fireworks (1749), and the twelve Concerti Grossi Op. 6 (1739).
Musical style and legacy
Handel's music is characterised by dramatic grandeur, powerful choral writing, memorable melodic invention, and an instinctive command of theatrical effect. He became a British subject in 1727 and was the dominant figure in London's musical life until blindness curtailed his activities in his final years. He died on 14 April 1759 and was buried in Westminster Abbey, honoured as one of the greatest composers Britain had adopted as its own.