Messiah (Handel): overview, history, music and legacy

The title Messiah refers to an original Hebrew sovereign title from the Jewish Bible and means "the anointed one" (Hebrew משיח Maschiach). Already in the Septuagint translation of the Hebrew Bible, the word was predominantly translated as Christ.

The idea for Messiah came from Charles Jennens, who had previously written the libretto for the oratorio Saul and probably compiled the text for Israel in Egypt from biblical words. In July 1741 he told a friend that he wanted Handel to set another collection of biblical passages to music and perform it during Holy Week.

Handel actually did not want to do anything in the 1741/42 season. The season before, his last attempt to continue his Italian operas with Imeneo and Deidamia had failed. The occasion for the composition of a new oratorio was finally provided by an invitation to a concert series in Dublin.

Handel wrote the music at his usual tempo and, as with other operas and oratorios, made partial use of earlier pieces, including his Italian duet cantatas. Having begun on 22 August 1741, he completed the first part on 28 August, the second on 6 September, and the third on 12 September. With the orchestration completed, the score was finished on September 14 - 24 days later. Immediately thereafter he turned to another oratorio, Samson, and composed most of it, but revised it substantially again in the fall of 1742.

In November 1741 Handel travelled to Dublin. On 2 October Mr Neale's Great Musick Hall had opened there in Fishamble Street, where from December he offered a subscription series in which L'Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato and other oratorio works were performed. Even before the first performance of Messiah, he changed some passages and composed new numbers. A delay in the preparations was caused by the fact that Jonathan Swift - Dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral - initially did not want to give his choristers permission to take part in the concert. The first performance on 13 Apriljul^. / 24 April 1742greg^. was announced as a benefit concert for several charitable organizations:

After the performances of Messiah, Handel left Dublin in August and returned to London. Compared with the enthusiastic reception in Dublin, the establishment of Messiah in the London concert scene was more problematic. Already with Israel in Egypt there had been voices criticising the rendering of biblical words in a profane theatre; in the case of Messiah there was the added problem of quotations from the Gospels being used for an evening's entertainment. Even years later, the work was condemned as blasphemous.

Perhaps because of these reservations, the oratorio was announced as A New Sacred Oratorio for the first London performance at CoventGarden Theatre on 19 March 1743, without giving the title Messiah. This was retained in 1745 and 1749. It was not until 1750 that an annual performance tradition began, in that Handel now concluded his Lenten oratorio seasons with a performance of Messiah, and after Easter gave a further performance in the chapel of the Foundling Hospital, the proceeds of which went to benefit foundlings and orphans.

Handel himself conducted Messiah many times, often modifying it to suit current needs. Consequently, no version can be considered "authentic", and many more changes and arrangements were added in the following centuries - for example Der Messias by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1789, commissioned by Gottfried van Swieten (German text version by Christoph Daniel Ebeling).