Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/457

Rh HANDEL 435 proved too powerful, and in January 1712 we find him back in London, evidently little inclined to return to Hanover in spite of his duties at the court there. Two Italian operas, the celebrated Utrecht Te Deum written by- command of Queen Anne, and other works belong to this period. It was in such circumstances somewhat awkward for the composer when bis deserted master came to London as George I. of England. Neither was the king slow in resenting the wrongs of the elector. For a considerable time Handel was not allowed to appear at court, and it was only through the intercession of his patron Baron Kielmansegge that his pardon was at last obtained. Com missioned by the latter, Handel wrote his celebrated Water- Music, which was performed at a great fete on the Thames, and so pleased the king that he at once received the com poser to his good graces. A salary of 200 a year granted to Handel was the immediate result of this happy consum mation. In 171G he followed the king to Germany, where he wrote a second German &quot; Passion/ the words this time being supplied by Brockes, a well-known poet of the day. After his return to England he entered the service of the duke of Chandos as conductor of his private concerts. In this capacity he resided for three years at Cannons, the duke s splendid seat near Edgeware, and pro duced the two Te Deums arid the twelve Anthems surnamed Chandos. The English pastoral Acts and Galatea (not to be mistaken for the Italian cantata of that name written at Naples, with which it has nothing in common), and his first oratorio to English words Esther, were written during his stay at Cannons. It was not till 1720 that he appeared again in a public capacity, viz., in that of impresario of an Italian opera at the Haymarket Theatre, which he managed for the so-called Royal Academy of Music. Senesino, a celebrated singer, to engage whom the composer specially journeyed to Dresden, was the mainstay of the enterprise, which opened with a highly successful performance of Handel s opera Radamista. Miizio Scevola, written in conjunction with Buononcini and Ariosti, Tamerlane, Roddinda, and other operas composed for the same theatre, are now forgotten, only detached songs being heard at concerts. To this time also belongs the celebrated rivalry of Handel and Buononcini, a gifted Italian composer, who by his clique was declared to be infinitely superior to the German master. The controversy raised a storm in the aristocratic teapot, and has been perpetuated in the lines generally but erroneously attributed to Swift, and in reality written by John Byrom : Some say, compared to Buononcini, That Mynheer Handel s but a ninny ; Others aver that lie to Handel Is scarcely fit to hold a candle. Strange all this difference should be Twixt Tweedle-dum and IVeedle-dee. Although the contempt for music, worthy of Chesterfield himself, shown in these lines may seem absurd, they yet contain a grain of truth. Handel differed from his rival only in degree not in essence. In other words, he was an infinitely greater composer than Buonon cini, but had he continued to write Italian opera there is no reason to conclude from his existing works of that class that he would have reformed or in any essential point modified the existing genre. The contest was therefore essentially of a personal nature, and in these circumstances it is hardly necessary to add that Handel remained victorious. Buononcini for a reason not suffi ciently explained left London, and Handel was left with out a rival. But in spite of this his connexion with Italian opera was not to be a source of pleasure or of wealth to the great composer. For twenty years the indomitable master was engaged in various operatic ventures, in spite of a rival company under the great singer Farinelli. started by his enemies, in spite also of his bankruptcy in 1737, and an attack of paralysis caused by anxiety and overwork. Of the numerous operas produced by him during this period it would be needless to speak in detail. Only the name of the final work of the long series, Deidamia, produced in 1741, maybe mentioned here. That Handel s non-success was not caused by the inferiority of his works to those of other composers is sufficiently proved by the fact that the rival company also had to be dissolved for want of support. But Handel was in more than one way disqualified for the post of operatic manager, dependent in those days even more than in ours on the patronage of the great. To sub mit to the whims and the pride of the aristrocracy was not in the nature of the upright Overman, who even at the con certs of the princess of Wales would use language not often heard at courts when the talking of tLe ladies during the performance irritated him. And, what was perhaps still more fatal, he opposed with equal firmness the caprices and inartistic tendencies of those absolute rulers of the Italian stage the singers. The story is told that he took hold of an obstinate prima donna and held her at arm s length out of window, threatening to drop her into the street below unless she would sing a par ticular passage in the proper way. Such arguments were irresistible at the time, but their final results were equally obvious, in spite of Handel s essentially kindly nature and the ready assistance he gave to those who really wished to learn. No wonder therefore that his quarrels with virtuosi were numerous, and that Senesino deserted him at a critical moment for the enemy s camp. It is a question whether Handel s change from opera to oratorio has been altogether in the interest of musical art. The opera lost in him a great power, but it may well be doubted whether dramatic music such as it was in those days would have been a proper mould for his genius. Neither is it certain that that genius was, strictly speaking, of a dramatic cast. There are no doubt in his oratorios for in these alone Handel s power is displayed in its matu rity examples of great dramatic force of expression ; but Handel s genius was in want of greater expansion than the economy of the drama will allow of. It was no doubt for this reason that from an inner necessity he created for him self the form of the oratorio, which in spite of the dialogue in which the plot is developed is in all essentials the musical equivalent of the epic. This breadth and depth of the epic is recognized in those marvellous choral pieces expressive either of pictorial detail (as the gnats and the darkness tangible and impenetrable in Israel in Egypt) or of the com bined religious feeling of an entire nation. By the side of these even the finest solo pieces of Handel s scores appear comparatively insignificant, and we cannot sufficiently wonder at the obtuseness of the public which demanded the insertion of miscellaneous operatic arias as a relief from the incessant choruses in Israel in Egypt at the second per formance of that great work in 1740. Handel is less the exponent of individual passion than the interpreter of the sufferings and aspirations of a nation, or in a wider sense of mankind. Take, for instance, the celebrated Dead March in Said. It is full of intense grief, in spite of the key of C major, which ought once for all to dispel the pre judice that sorrow always speaks in minor keys. Even Chopin himself has not been able to give utterance to the feeling in more impressive strains. And yet the measured and decisive rhythm, and the simple diatonic harmonies, plainly indicate that here a mighty nation deplores the death of a hero. It is for the same reason that Handel s stay in England was of such great influence on his artistic career. Generally speaking, there is little connexion between politics and art. But it may be said without exaggeration that only amongst a free people, and a people having a national