Handel: Messiah
Academy of Ancient Music, Laurence Cummings
The Barbican, 17 December 2024

Handel’s Messiah is a curious piece. Usually ritualistically churned out at Christmas and Easter, it was first performed at Easter in Dublin in 1742 after a mere 24 days of composition (a speed not unusual in Handel’s opera compositions), the autograph score bearing witness to the compositional haste. It went through several revisions in the following years, generally to suit the available forces for each performance. The score wasn’t published until eight years after Handel’s death. The version used for this Barbican performance from the Academy of Ancient Music stems from the early 1750s. The rather obtuse libretto was put together by the wealthy landowner, Charles Jennens, from the King James Bible and Psalms from the Book of Common Prayer, seemingly in support of his staunch Anglican leanings. The text is not easy to follow, let alone understand, but Handel composed with apparent relish, making no change to the texts to suit his musical ideas.

Continue reading →