Gastone dei Medici had made him. Was such protection as useful to Handel
as he had hoped? One may be allowed to doubt it. In truth the son of the
Grand Duke of Tuscany, Ferdinand, was a musician. He played the clavier
well;[92] he had caused an opera house to be built in his villa at
Pratolino; he chose the _libretti_, advised the composers, corresponded
with Alessandro Scarlatti, but he had never a very reliable taste. He
found Scarlatti's style too learned. He begged him to write some easier
music, and, as far as possible, lighter.[93] He himself did not continue
the fastidiousness of the Medici, his ancestors. He somewhat stinted his
outlay on music. He decided not to appoint Scarlatti his chapel-master,
and when this great artist asked for money at a period of embarrassment
he responded "that he would pray for him."[94] One can scarcely believe
that he was less economical in his dealings with Handel, who had less
reputation than Scarlatti. He seems to have paid little attention to him
during his first visit. The Prince himself seemed out of his element in
this new world. It was necessary for him to catch up with his times.
Handel certainly wrote some cantatas, only one of which, _Lucretia_,
with a dramatic character, was very popular in Italy and in Germany
later on.[95] Its style was nearly completely German.
From Florence he went to Rome for the Easter festivals in April, 1707.
Even there the moment was not very favourable for him. The Grand Opera
House, the _Tor di Nona_, had been destroyed as immoral by an edict of
Pope Innocent XII ten years before. Since 1700, things had been a little
easier for the musicians, but in 1703 a terrible earthquake had
desolated the country, and reawakened religious qualms.[96] Even in
1709, during the whole of Handel's sojourn in Italy, there was not a
single representation of Opera at Rome. On the other hand, religious
music and chamber music were enjoying a great vogue. Handel, during the
first months, listened and studied the religious music at Rome, and
tried his hand on similar works. From this period dated his Latin
Psalms.[97] Thanks to the letters of recommendation he had from the
Medici, he had also been introduced into the Roman _salons_. He became
famous there, more on account of his _virtuoso_ powers on the keyboard
than of those of composer. He remained at Rome until the autumn of
1707.[98] Doubtless, he returned to Florence in the month of October,
and it appears that he then produced _Roderigo_ for the first time.
Handel had then been nearly a year in Italy. He set about writing an
opera in Italian. His boldness was justified. _Roderigo_ was successful.
Handel gained through it the favour of the Grand Duke, and the love of
the Prima Donna, Vittoria Tarquini.[99] Fortified by his first victory
he went on to try his luck at Venice.
Venice was then the musical metropolis of Italy. It was in a way the
real kingdom of Opera. The first public opera house had been already
open there for half a century, and after it, fifteen other opera houses
had sprung into being. During the Carnival no less than seven opera
houses were open each evening there. Every night also a musical union
was held at the Academy of Music, and occasionally twice or even three
times in one evening. Every day in the churches, musical solemnities
and concerts, which lasted for many hours, with several orchestras, many
organs, and numerous full and echo choirs,[100] and on Saturday and
Sunday the famous Vespers of the Hospitals, those conservatoires for
women where they taught music to orphans and foundlings, or, more
frequently, to the girls who had fine voices. They gave orchestral and
vocal concerts, over which all Venice raved. Venice, indeed, was bathed
in music, the entire life was threaded with it. Life was a perpetual
round of pleasure.
When Handel arrived, the greatest of the Italian musicians, Alessandro
Scarlatti, was about to produce at St. John Chrysostom's Theatre his
chief work, _Mitridate Eupatore_, one of the rare Italian operas of
which the dramatic beauty is on a par with the musical value. Was
Alessandro Scarlatti still in Venice when Handel met him? We do not
know, but in any case he encountered him at Rome some months later, and
it appears that at that time Handel was tied by bonds of friendship to
the son of Alessandro,--Domenico.[101] He also made many other
encounters in Venice, which were destined to change his life. The
Prince of Hanover, Ernest Augustus, and the Duke of Manchester, the
English Ambassador Extraordinary at Venice, were both passionate
music-lovers, and interested themselves in Handel. The first invitations
which Handel received to go to Hanover, and to London, dated doubtless
from that time.
But if the visit to Venice was not fruitless to the future of Handel, it
brought him very little at the time. Handel could produce nothing at any
of the seven opera houses.[102] He was much happier at Rome, where he
returned at the beginning of March, 1708.[103] The renown of his
_Roderigo_ had preceded him. All the Italian merchants strove to receive
him with honour. He was the guest of the Marquis Ruspoli, whose gardens
on the Esquilino formed the bond of reunion for the Academy of the
Arcadians.[104] Handel found himself agreeably placed amongst the most
illustrious men which Italy boasted in literature, the arts, and in the
aristocracy. Arcadia, which united the nobility and the artists,[105] in
a spiritual brotherhood, counted amongst its members, Alessandro
Scarlatti, Archangelo Corelli, Bernardo Pasquini, and Benedetto
Marcello.[106] A similar _elite_ society was found at the _soirees_ of
the Cardinal Ottoboni.[107] Every Monday, in the palace of Ottoboni, as
at the meetings of the Arcadia, concerts and poetical recitations were
given. The Cardinal Prince, Superintendent of the Pontifical chapel, had
in his service the finest orchestra in Italy,[108] and the singers of
the Sistine Chapel. At the Arcadia there was also to be heard a numerous
orchestra, under the direction of Corelli, of Pasquini, or of Scarlatti.
Musical and poetical improvisation was also given there. It was that
which provoked the artistic jousts between poets and musicians.[109] It
was for the concerts at the palace of Ottoboni that Handel wrote his
two Roman oratorios, _The Resurrection_ and _The Triumph of Time and
Truth_,[110] which were really but disguised operas. One finds traces of
the Arcadia _coterie_ in the compositions which are perhaps the most
characteristic of this period in the life of Handel: the Italian
cantatas,[111] of which the reputation spread itself very wide, for J.
S. Bach made a copy of one of them before 1715.[112] Handel passed three
or four months at Rome. He was friendly with Corelli, and with the two
Scarlattis, especially with the son, Domenico, who made many trials of
virtuosity with him.[113] Perhaps he also played with Bernardo Pasquini,
whom he doubtless heard more than once on his organ at Great St. Mary's.
He was interested in the life of the Vatican, and they tried to convert
him to Catholicism, but he refused. Such was the friendly tolerance
which prevailed then at the Court of Rome that, notwithstanding the war
between the Pope and Emperor, this refusal did not alter the friendly
relationships between the young German Lutheran and the Cardinals, his
patrons. He became so attached to Rome, that it was difficult for him to
leave it until the war which approached the city obliged him to take his
way in the month of May or June, 1708, to Naples. One of the Italian
cantatas entitled _Partenza_ shows his grief at leaving the lovely
banks, the dear walls, and the beautiful waters of the Tiber.
Soon after his arrival at Naples, Alessandro Scarlatti returned to
settle there after seven years of absence.[114]
Thanks to this friendship, and his membership of the Arcadia, Handel was
received into the best circles of Neapolitan society. He remained at
Naples for nearly a year, from June, 1708, to the spring of 1709,
enjoying princely hospitality, "which placed at his disposal," says
Mainwaring, "a palace, a well-supplied table, and a coach." If the
softness of the Italian life enervated him, he appears to have wasted no
time. Not only did he assimilate the style of his friend Corelli--he
conceived in Italy a passionate love of pictures[115]--but he attempted
with a carefully cultivated dilettantism the most diverse styles, with
which the cosmopolitan society of Naples amused its careless curiosity.
Spanish and French influence fought for the honours of this city.
Handel, as indifferent as Scarlatti to the victory of either of these
parties, tried to write in the style of both.[116] He interested himself
also in the Italian popular songs and noted down the rustic melodies of
the Calabrian _Pifferari_.[117] For the Arcadians of Naples he wrote his
beautiful serenata, _Acis and Galatea_.[118] Finally he had the good
fortune to please the Viceroy of Naples--the Cardinal Grimani. He was a
Venetian and his family owned the theatre of San Grisostomo at Venice.
Grimani wrote for Handel the libretto of the opera _Agrippina_, of which
Handel probably composed part of the music at Naples. A similar
collaboration assured it of being produced at Venice without trouble.
He left Naples in the springtime, and returned to Rome, where he met, at
the Palace of the Cardinal Ottoboni, Bishop Agostino Steffani, who by a
curious combination of attributes was at the same time Kapellmeister at
the Court of Hanover, and charged with secret missions by different
German princes.[119] Steffani was one of the most finished musicians of
his time. He established a firm friendship with Handel, possibly when
travelling together to Venice, where Handel's _Agrippina_ was played at
the opening of the Carnival season, 1709-10, at the theatre of San
Giovanni Grisostomo.[120] The success exceeded all anticipations.
Mainwaring says that he took all his hearers by storm. There were great
acclamations, and cries of _Viva il caro Sassone_ and extravagances
impossible to record. The grandeur of the style struck them all like
thunder. The Italians had good reason to rejoice, for they found in
Handel a most brilliant exponent, and _Agrippina_ is the most melodious
of his Italian operas. Venice then made and unmade reputations. The
enthusiasm aroused by the representations at San Giovanni Grisostomo's
spread itself out over the whole of musical Europe. Handel remained the
whole of the winter at Venice. He seemed undecided as to what course to
follow. It was quite on the cards that he should pass through
Paris.[121] Handel had familiarised himself with the French
language.[122] He showed, as it happened, a singular attraction for the
most beautiful subjects of our French tragedy.[123] With his prodigious
adaptability, and his Latin qualities, the clarity of his lines, his
eloquence, logic, and his passionate love for form, he would have
rejoiced exceedingly in assimilating the tradition of our art, and
taking it up with an irresistible vigour.[124] But at Venice, whilst he
was still hesitating what to do, he encountered the Hanoverian nobles,
amongst whom was the Baron Kielmansegg, who invited him to follow them.
Steffani himself had offered him with a charming grace his post as
Kapellmeister at the Court of Hanover. Handel went then to Hanover.
* * * * *
There were four brothers who became in turn Dukes of Hanover: Christian
Louis, George William, John Frederick, and Ernest Augustus.[125] All
four were under the spell of France and Italy. They passed the greater
part of their time away from their own States, choosing Venice for
preference. George William married morganatically a French lady of the
noble family of Poitou, Eleonora d'Olbreuse. John Frederick was
pensioned by Louis XIV, and became Catholic. He took Versailles for his
model, and founded an Opera in 1672 at Hanover. He had also the acumen
to call Leibnitz into his States,[126] but he took great care on his
side that he should remain there. He died in the course of a journey to
Venice. Ernest Augustus, who succeeded him, in 1680, was the patron of
Steffani. He married the beautiful and intelligent Duchess Sophia, a
Palatine princess, stepdaughter of James I Stuart, aunt of the Palatine
of France, and sister of the Princess Elizabeth, friend of
Descartes.[127] She herself was the friend and correspondent of
Leibnitz, who admired her. She had great intellectual gifts, spoke seven
languages, read widely, and had a natural taste for the beautiful. "No
one had greater gifts," said Madame her niece, Michel de Montaigne. With
great lucidity of thought, decidedly outspoken, she professed an
epicurean materialism of great superiority and intelligence.[128] Her
husband valued her little, but he was brilliant and ostentatious. They
were the most polished and distinguished couple in Germany at the Court
of Hanover.[129] Both loved music, but Ernest Augustus seems never to
have dreamt that it existed anywhere outside of Italy, and he might
almost as well have been called the "Duke of Venice" as the Duke of
Hanover, for he was constantly in Venice, and never wished to leave it
for long.[130]
The Hanover people began to murmur. The only means they could find of
keeping their Prince at home with them was to build a magnificent opera
house where spectacles and _fetes_ resembling those in Venice could be
given. The idea was good. Ernest Augustus warmly took up the scheme for
his opera house, which, built and decorated by the Italians between 1687
and 1690, was the most beautiful in all Germany.[131] For this opera
house Steffani was engaged as Kapellmeister.[132] Agostina Steffani is
one of the most curious figures in history.[133] Born in 1653 at
Castelfranco, near Venice, of a poor family, after being a choir-boy at
St. Mark's, he was taken in 1667 to Munich by the Count of Tattenbach,
who had been the pupil of Ercole Bernabei, a master brought up in the
purest Roman style.[134] At the same time he had been given a very
complete education in literature, science, and theology, for he was
destined for the priesthood, and with a view to becoming Abbe.[135] He
was appointed organist at the Court, and music-director. Since 1681 a
set of his operas, played at Munich (and especially _Servio Tullio_ in
1685[136]), spread his renown through Germany. The Duke of Hanover
enticed him to his Court, and in 1689 the new Hanoverian theatre was
inaugurated by one of Steffani's operas, for which the Duchess Sophia
furnished, it is said, the patriotic subject _Henrico Leoni_.[137] Then
followed a set of fifteen operas of which the _mise en scene_ and music
had an amazing popularity in Germany.[138] Cousser introduced them at
Hamburg as models of true Italian song, and Keiser modelled himself
partly on them, ten years before Handel in his turn followed Keiser's
pattern. The Opera did not enjoy a long life at Hanover. The Duke alone
liked it. The Duchess Sophia had much less sympathy for this kind of
art.[139] The ballets and the masquerades put the Opera to shame.
Steffani was otherwise occupied with more serious business elsewhere. In
the Treaty of Augsburg, Ernest Augustus of Hanover had taken sides with
the Emperor. To recompense his fidelity the Emperor bestowed on him the
dignity of Prince-Elect, but in the confusion of the Empire it was not
easy to clear up the situation. It was necessary to send an Ambassador
Extraordinary to the great German Courts. The choice of all fell on
Steffani, who, being a Catholic Abbe, could more easily serve as
intermediary between the Protestant Court of Hanover and the Catholic
Courts;[140] his mission was so well accomplished that in 1697 the Duke
of Hanover obtained for him the title of Elector. This astonishing
diplomat had found the means of writing operas. After the death of
Ernest Augustus in 1698 he gave up opera writing, but continued to
occupy himself with politics. He became in 1703 the secret adviser to
the Elector Palatine, the President of the Religious Council, who was
created a noble. At the same time Pope Innocent II made him in 1706
Bishop of Spiga.[141] The Elector Palatine created him his Grand Almoner
and gave him charge of the Italian and Latin correspondence with the
Duke of Brunswick. From November, 1708, to April, 1709, Steffani stayed
at Rome, where the Pope crowded honours on him, making him Prelate of
the Chamber, Assistant to the Throne, Abbe of St. Steffano in Carrara,
and Apostolic Vicar of the north of Germany, with the supervision of the
Catholics in Palatine, Brunswick, and Brandenburg.[142] Then it was, as
we have seen, that he met Handel. It is necessary to sketch briefly the
life of this extraordinary personage, who was at the same time Abbe,
Bishop, Apostolic Vicar, intimate Councillor and Ambassador of Princes,
organist, Kapellmeister, musical critic,[143] chief singer,[144] and yet
composer--not only for the interest of his personality, but because he
exercised considerable influence on Handel, who always retained a
pleasant remembrance of him.
The feature in Steffani's art, and that by which he is superior to all
of his own time, is his mastery of the art of singing. Well accustomed
as all the Italians were to it, none wrote so purely for the voice as
he. Scarlatti was not concerned with carrying the voice to its full
limits, either for an expressive purpose or with a concerted intention.
Thus in Steffani, as Hugo Goldschmidt says, "the singer held the pen."
His work is the most perfect picture of Italian song in a golden age,
and Handel owes to it his very refined feeling for the _bel canto_. In
truth Steffani's operas gained little by this virtuosity. They were
mediocre from the dramatic point of view, not very expressive, abused
the vocalisation, and were essentially operas for singers.[145] They
revealed a curious harmonic vein, and a contrapuntal alertness, which
strongly contrasted with the nearly homophonic writing of Lully,[146]
but the principal glory of Steffani was in his chamber vocal music, and
especially in his duets.[147] These duets are of various types, and of
various lengths. One is a single piece. Others are in the _Da Capo_
form. Some are veritable cantatas with recitatives, soli, and duets.
Others are consecutive pieces, forming, as it were, little song-cycles.
The writing in this form was evolved from Schuetz and Bernabei to Handel
and Telemann, but their inner construction is usually the same: the
first voice announces alone the first phrase, which reflects the poetic
emotion of the piece; the second voice repeats the subject in the unison
or in the octave; with the second subject the voices leave the unison
and indulge in canonic imitations which are freely treated. Then a
return is made to the first part, which concludes the piece. When the
duet is more developed, after the first air in the minor key, a second
one comes in the major, where virtuosity is given free play, after which
the minor air recurs. These works possess an admirable melodic beauty,
and an expression often quite profound. In the lighter subjects Steffani
has an easy gracefulness, the elegant fancy of Scarlatti. In his sad
moments he reaches the highest models: from Schuetz, from Provenzale,
even to J. S. Bach. He is one of the greatest lyricists in the music of
the seventeenth century.[148] These duets set the style in this form of
work. The _role_ played by Steffani in music can very well be compared
with that of Fra Bartolommeo in painting;--both applied themselves with
perfect art, and steadfast spirit, to find the laws of composition in
limited and restrained forms: Fra Bartolommeo sought for the balance of
groups, and the harmony of lines in scenes, with three or four persons
grouped in a round picture; Steffani concentrated all the efforts of his
ingenuity, invention, and artistic science into the somewhat limited
form of the duet. These two religious artists both have a luminous art;
both are sure of themselves, have learning and simplicity, with little
or no passion. Their souls are noble, pure, a little impersonal. They
were intended to prepare the way for others. As Chrysander says, "Handel
walked in the steps of Steffani, but his feet were larger."
* * * * *
Handel made only a short stay at Hanover in 1710. Hardly had he taken up
his duties when he asked and obtained leave to go to England, from
whence proposals had been made to him. He crossed Holland, and arrived
at London at the end of the autumn, 1710. He was then twenty-five years
old. The English musical era was broken off. Fifteen years before,
England had lost its greatest musician, Henry Purcell, who died
prematurely at the age of thirty-six.[149]
In his short life he had produced a considerable amount of work: operas,
cantatas, religious music, and instrumental pieces. He was a cultured
genius, and intimately acquainted with Lully, Carissimi, and the Italian
sonatas, at the same time very English, possessing the gift of
spontaneous melody, and never losing contact with the spirit of the
British race. His art was full of grace and delicacy, much more
aristocratic than that of Lully. He is the Van Dyck of music. Everything
of his is of extreme elegance, refinement, ease, slightly _exsangue_.
His art is natural: always steeped in the country life which is indeed
the source of the English inspiration. There are no operas of the
seventeenth century where one finds fresher melodies which are more
inspired and yet of a popular character. This charming artist was
delicate, of a weak constitution, somewhat feminine in character,
feeble, and of little stamina. His poetic languor was his strongest
appeal, and at the same time his weak point; he was prevented from
following his artistic progress with the tenacity of a Handel. Most of
his works lack finish. He never tried to break down the final barriers
which separated him from perfection. His musical compositions are
sketches of genius with strange weaknesses. He produced many hastily
finished operas with singular awkwardnesses in the manner of treating
the instruments and the voice,--ill-fitting cadences, monotonous
rhythms, a spoilt harmonic tissue, and, finally, in his larger pieces
and those of grander scale, there is a lack of breath, a sort of
physical exhaustion, which prevents him reaching the end of his superb
ideas. But it is necessary to take him for what he is, one of the most
poetic figures in music--smiling, yet a little elegiac--a miniature
Mozart eternally convalescent. Nothing vulgar, nothing brutal, ever
enters his music. Captivating melodies, coming straight from the heart,
where the purest of English souls mirrors itself. Full of delicate
harmonies, of caressing dissonances, a taste for the clashing of
sevenths and seconds, of incessant poising between the major and minor,
and with delicate and varied nuances of a pale tint, vague and slightly
blurred, like the springtime sun piercing through a light mist.[150] He
only wrote one real opera, the admirable _Dido and AEneas_, of 1680.[151]
His other dramatic works, very numerous, were music for the stage, and
the most beautiful type of this kind is that which he wrote for Dryden's
_King Arthur_ in 1691. This music is nearly all episodical. One cannot
remove it without causing the essential action to suffer. The English
taste was impatient of operas sung from one end to the other, and in
Handel's time Addison endeavoured to voice this national repugnance in
his _Spectator_.
It was a good thing that Handel had an altogether different idea of
opera, and that his personality differed greatly from that of Purcell,
which left him no point for profiting (as he had done with others) by
the genius of his predecessor. Arriving in a strange country, of which
he did not even know the language or the spirit, it was natural that he
should take the English master as his guide. Hence the analogies between
them. Purcell's Odes often give one the impression of being merely a
sketch of the cantatas and oratorios of Handel. One finds there the same
architectural style, the same contrast of movements, of instrumental
colours, of large ensembles, and of _soli_. Certain dances,[152] some of
the heroic airs, with irresistible rhythms and triumphant fanfares,[153]
are there already before Handel, but they are only there as brilliant
flashes with Purcell. Both his personality and his art were different.
Like so many fine musicians of that time, he has been swallowed up in
Handel, just as a stream of water loses itself in a river. But there was
nevertheless in this little spring a poetry peculiar to England, which
the entire work of Handel has not--nor can have.