had given unsuccessfully an opera, _Narcissus_, 1720.
[185] He was born in 1671 or 1672, for his first opus appeared in 1684
or 1685, when he was little more than thirteen years old.
Giovanni Bononcini was far from being well known. He was not a
celebrated musician, on which account there are many disagreements.
Bononcini was the name of a long string of musicians, and one has been
frequently confounded with the other. Such mistakes are found even in
the critical work of Eitner (where they rest on a great error in
reading) and in the most recent Italian works, as that of Luigi Torchi,
who in his instrumental music in Italy, 1901, confounds all the
Bononcini together. Luigi Francesco Valdreghi's monograph _I Bononcini
in Modena_, 1882, is more reliable, although very incomplete.
[186] Gianmaria Bononcini was Chapel-Master of the Cathedral of Modena,
and attached to the service of Duke Francis II. A fine violinist, author
of instrumental sonatas in suites, to which Mr. Torchi and Sir Hubert
Parry attribute great historical importance. He had a reflective spirit,
and dedicated in 1673 to the Emperor Leopold I a treatise on Harmony and
Counterpoint, entitled _Musico Practico_, which was afterwards
reprinted. He died in 1678, less than forty years old.
[187] Several of his early works are dedicated to Francis II of Modena,
and his 8th opus, _Duetti da Camera_, 1691, is dedicated to the Emperor
Leopold I, who caused him to be engaged for the Court Chapel.
[188] He was a celebrated violoncellist.
[189] Alfred Ebert: _Attilo Ariosto in Berlin_, 1905, Leipzig.
[190] See Lecerf de la Vieville: _Eclaircissement sur Bononcini_,
published in the 3rd part of his _Comparaison de la musique francaise
avec la musique italienne_ (1706).
[191] "Like Corelli," says Lecerf, "he had a few fugues, contra fugues,
based on conceits, frequently in other Italian works, and he made many
delicious things from all the lesser used intervals, the most valiant
and the most strange. His dissonances struck fear."
[192] See the gentle suspension of notes in the Cantata _Dori e Aminta_
(manuscript in the Library of the Conservatoire of Paris), or the
_Cantata Care luci (ibid.)_.
[193] "What is necessary in music," said _The London Journal_ of
February 24, 1722, "is that it should chase away _ennui_, and relieve
clever men from the trouble of thinking."
[194] It is the eternal struggle between the art of knowledge and the
pseudo-popular art. It recurred again a little later with Rousseau. The
principal difference between the two phases of the strife is that in the
epoch with which we are occupied the champion of the anti-learned art
was a well-instructed musician who did not uphold his cause by
ignorance, but by laziness and by profligacy.
[195] "To study this more closely," says Hugo Goldschmidt (_Vocal
Ornamentation_, 1908), "Bononcini's songs are really _lieder_, to which
is applied, for good or evil, the old form of the Aria Da Capo, or the
Cavatina: the taste for little airs in the form of a song spread itself
widely during the end of the seventeenth century in Germany and in
England." Bononcini, who was always led naturally by fashion, and by his
indolent facility, abandoned himself to it still more in England, and
suited it to the English taste.
[196] The work had already been given in Italy about 1714. It was then
that Lord Burlington heard it, and became the champion of Bononcini when
he decided to come to England.
[197] Handel wrote the third act, Bononcini the second, the first had
been already set by a certain Signor Pippo (Phillipo Matti?).
[198] The victory of Handel began for the most part with the engagement
of his new interpreter, Francesca Cuzzoni, of Parma, a great and
vigorous artist, violent and passionate, whose excellent soprano voice
excelled particularly in pathetic _cantabile_ music. She was twenty-two
years old, and came to London, where she made her debut in _Ottone_. Her
quarrels with Handel, and how he treated her by threatening to throw her
out of the window, are well known.
Handel gave again in May another opera, _Flavio_, of little importance.
On his side Bononcini produced _Erminia and Attilio_, _Aristosi_,
_Coreolanus_, in which the prison scene reduced the ladies to tears, and
inspired numerous analogous scenes in the following operas of Handel.
[199] Bononcini gave his last piece, _Kalfernia_, on April 18, 1724.
Ariosti says possibly in 1725. On the other hand, in 1725 there
commenced to be played in London the works of Leonardo Vinci, and
Porpora, patronized by Handel himself.
[200] Faustina Bordoni was born in 1700 at Venice. She had been educated
in the school of Marcello. In 1730 she married Hasse. Her singing had an
incredible agility. No one could repeat the same note with such
rapidity, and she seemed able to hold on sounds to any extent. Less
concentrated and less profound than Cuzzoni, she had an art more moving
and brilliant.
[201] Two months before Handel had given the opera _Scipione_ (March 12,
1726).
[202] The Director of the Drury Lane Theatre, Colley Cibber, produced, a
month later, a farce called _The Contretemps, or The Rival Queens_,
where the two singers were depicted tearing their chignons, and Handel
saying in anger to them, whom he wished to separate, "Leave them alone,
when they are tired their fury will spend itself out," and, in order
that the strife might be definitely finished, he wound it up with great
strokes on the drum. Handel's friend, Dr. Arbuthnot, also published on
this subject one of his best pamphlets, "The Devil let loose at St.
James's" (see Chrysander, Volume II).
[203] The last representation at the Academy took place on June 1, 1728,
with _Almeto_.
[204] Amongst others, the accompanied recitative, the air _Da Capo_, the
opera duets, the farewell scenes, the great prison scenes, the
inconsequent ballads. Pepusch even took an air of Handel and parodied
it. In the second act a band of robbers came together in the tavern, and
solemnly defiled before their chiefs to the sound of the March of the
Crusaders' Army in _Rinaldo_--_The Beggar's Opera_, given for the first
time on January 29, 1728, was played all over England, and aroused
violent polemics. Swift became a passionate champion for it. After the
success appeared in the following years a number of operas with
songs--Georgy Kalmas has dedicated a very complete article to _The
Beggar's Opera_ in his _Sammelbaende der I.M.G._ (January to March,
1907).
[205] The first three books of the _Dunciad_ of Pope appeared in 1728;
_The Voyages of Gulliver_ in 1726. Swift did not forget the musical
folly in his satire on the kingdom of Lilliputia.
[206] The Coronation Anthems comprised four hymns, of which we do not
know the exact order. Handel arranged for their presentation at
Westminster by forty-seven singers, and a very considerable orchestra.
[207] _Riccardo I_, played in November of the same year (see p. 81), was
also a national opera, dedicated to King George II, and celebrating,
_apropos_ of Richard Coeur de Lion, the annals of Old England.
[208] See page 48, note 4, the opinions held by Sere de Rieux.
[209] Sere de Rieux: _les Dons les infants de Latone; la Musique et la
Chasse du cerf_, poems dedicated to the King, 1734, Paris, p. 102-3.
[210] During this voyage, where he sojourned a considerable time at
Venice, he learned that his mother was stricken with paralysis. He
hastened to Halle, so that he might see her again, but she could no
longer see him. For several years she had been blind. She died the
following year, December 27, 1730. Whilst Handel was at Halle watching
over his mother, he received a visit from Wilhelm Friedemann Bach, who
came on behalf of his father, to invite him to come to Leipzig. One can
well understand that Handel declined the invitation under his sad
circumstances.
[211] Born in 1690 at Strongoli in Calabria, he died in 1730. He was the
master of the Chapel Royal at Naples, where he preceded Pergolesi and
Hasse. I have spoken of Vinci in another volume.
[212] _Acis and Galatea_ was reproduced in 1731, then given again in
1732, at the Haymarket Theatre, with the scenery and costumes, under the
title of _An English Pastoral Opera_. The representation had taken place
without the consent of Handel, who in response to the event, gave the
work himself a little later. As for _Esther_, a member of the Academy of
Ancient Music, Bernard Gates who had formerly sung in the piece at the
Duke of Chandos' and who possessed a copy of it, produced it at the
Hostelry of the Crown and Anchor, on February 23, 1732. In his turn
Handel directed the work on May 2, 1732, at the Haymarket Theatre, under
the title of English _Oratorio_. These presentations did not appease the
interest of the public.
[213] In the "first place there were in all," said a pamphlet, "260
persons, of whom many had free tickets, and others were even paid to
come." Handel tried to give the work again at reduced prices. This
brought him no advantage. The English patrons repeated already their
exultation over the Saxon, and caused him to return to Germany.
[214] _Athaliah_ was written for the University feasts at Oxford, to
which Handel had been invited. They wished to confer on him there the
title of Doctor of Music. One does not know exactly what happened to
Handel, having always refused the honour. It is certain, however, that
Handel did not receive the title.
[215] Bononcini had been received into the Academy of Ancient Music at
London. To secure his footing he offered the Academy in 1728 a Madrigal
in five voices. Unfortunately for him, three years after, a member of
the Academy found this Madrigal in a book of duets, trios, madrigals of
Antonio Lotti, published in 1705 at Venice. Bononcini persisted in
claiming the authorship of the work. A long enquiry was instituted, in
which Lotti himself and a great number of witnesses were examined. The
result was disastrous for Bononcini, who threw up all and disappeared
from London towards the end of 1732--the whole of the correspondence
relating to this affair was published by the Academy in Latin, Italian,
French and English, under the title "Letters from the Academy of Ancient
Music at London to Signor Antonio Lotti of Venice, with answers and
testimonies, London, 1732."
[216] Porpora was the most famous Italian teacher of singing of the
eighteenth century. Hasse was himself a great singer, and married one of
the most celebrated Prima Donnas who ever lived, Faustina.
[217] Contrast with the short and restricted phrases of Benedetto
Marcello in his _Arianna_, the amplitude of Porpora's treatment of the
same subject.
[218] Chrysander, who did not know him well, speaks with a disdain
absolutely unjustifiable.
[219] Handel's _Arianna_, January 26, 1734. Porpora's _Arianna a Naxos_,
a little later.
[220] Thus the Invocation of Theseus to Neptune: _Nume che reggi'l
mare_, and the air: _Spetto d'orrore_.
[221] Johann Adolf Hasse was born March 23, 1699, at Bergedorf, near
Hamburg, and died on December 16, 1783, at Venice. He came to London in
October, 1734, where he gave his _Artaserse_, which was played until
about 1737. He also gave in England his Siroe, 1736, and two comic
_intermezzi_. I do not attach much importance to him, for his life and
his art are a little outside the scope of this work. Despite the efforts
of Handel's enemies, Hasse always avoided posing as the rival of his
great countryman, and their art remains independent of each other. I
will hold over (till some time later on) the study of the work of this
admirable artist, for posterity has been even more unjust to him than to
Porpora, for no one had his wonderful sense of melodic beauty in such a
degree, and in his best pages he is the equal of the very greatest.
[222] She was Handel's pupil and friend. An excellent musician, she
conducted the orchestra at public concerts given by her every evening in
Holland.
[223] Handel composed for the marriage of the Princess Anne _The Wedding
Anthem_ (March 14, 1734), which is a _pasticcio_ of old works,
especially _Athaliah_. He gave also for the marriage _fetes_ the
serenata, _Parnasso in festa_, and a revised form of _Pastor Fido_, with
choruses.
[224] It was John Rich who had produced here the _Beggar's Opera_ of Gay
and Pepusch in 1728--that parody of Handel's operas.
[225] She was the pupil of Mlle Prevost, and made her debut in 1725 with
Rich. See the study of M. Emile Dacier: _Une danseuse francaise a
Londres, au debut du XVIII siecle_ (French number of the S.I.M. May and
July, 1907).
[226] It is interesting to notice that it was with the same subjects of
_Pygmalion_ and of _Ariadne_ that J. J. Rousseau and Georg Benda
inaugurated in 1770-1775 the Melodrama or "opera without singing."
[227] He has been accused of knowing it too well. The Abbe Prevost wrote
exactly at this same period in _Le Pour et le Contre_ (1733): "...Certain
critics accuse him of having taken for his basis an infinite number of
beautiful things from Lully, and especially from our French cantatas,
and of having the effrontery of disguising them in the Italian manner...."
[228] "_La Salle_" returned to Paris, where she made her reappearance at
the Academie de Musique in August, 1735, in _les Indes galantes_ of
Rameau. It is quite remarkable that some pages of this work, such as the
superb chaconne at the end, have a character quite Handelian.
[229] _Atalanta_ (May 12, 1736), _Arminio_ (January 12, 1737),
_Giustino_ (February 16, 1737), _Berenice_ (May 18, 1737), _Faramondo_
(January 7, 1738), _Serse_ (April 15, 1738), _Imeneo_ (November 22,
1740), _Deidamia_ (January 10, 1741).
[230] Especially in _Serse_ and _Deidamia_.
[231] Dryden the poet wrote this brilliant poem in 1697 in a night of
inspiration. Clayton had set it to music in 1711; and again about 1720
Benedetto Marcello wrote a cantata in the ancient manner on an Italian
adaptation of the English ode by the Abbe Conti. A friend of Handel,
Newburgh Hamilton, arranged Dryden's poem with great discretion for
Handel's oratorio.
Handel had already written several times in honour of St. Cecilia. Some
fragments of four cantatas to St. Cecilia are to be found in Vol. LII of
the great Breitkopf edition (_Cantate italiane con stromenti_). They
were all written in London, the first about 1713.
[232] _Alexander's Feast_ (January, 1736), _Atalanta_ (April), _Wedding
Anthem_ (April), _Giustino_ (August), _Arminio_ (September), _Berenice_
(December).
[233] June 1, 1737. But on June 11 the rival opera also closed its
doors, ruined. Handel, like Samson, dragged down in his own fall the
enemy whom he wished to annihilate.
[234] On November 15, 1737, Handel commenced _Faramondo_; from December
7 to 17 he wrote the _Funeral Anthem_. On December 24 he finished
_Faramondo_. On December 25 he commenced _Serse_.
[235] He said that these kinds of concerts were but a way of begging.
[236] Vauxhall was a beautiful garden on the Thames, the meeting place
of London Society. Every evening except Sunday from the end of April to
the beginning of August, vocal, orchestral, and organ concerts were
given. The manager of these entertainments, Tyers, caused a white marble
statue of Handel by the sculptor Roubiliac to be placed in a niche of a
large grotto. The same sculptor later on executed Handel's statue for
his monument in Westminster Abbey.
[237] In the first part of _Israel in Egypt_ there is not a single solo
air to be found. In the whole work there are nineteen choruses against
four solos and three duets. The poem of _Saul_ which Chrysander at first
attributed to Jennens appears to have been, as he discovered later on,
the work of Newburgh Hamilton. For _Israel_, Handel entirely dispensed
with a librettist, taking the pure Bible text.
[238] Written between September 29 and October 30, 1739. Handel further
prepared in November, 1740, the Second Volume of Organ Concertos (six).
The same month he opened his last season of opera, giving on November 22
_Imeneo_, which was only played twice, and on January 14, 1741,
_Deidamia_, which was only given three times.
[239] Especially in the _Allegro_ and in certain _Concerti Grossi_.
[240] An anonymous letter published in the _London Daily Post_ of April
4, 1741, alludes to a single false step made without premeditation.
[241] In the midst of his misery he still thought of those more
miserable than himself. In April, 1738, he founded with other well-known
English musicians, Arne, Greene, Pepusch, Carey, etc., the Society of
Musicians for the succour of aged and poor musicians. Tormented as he
was himself, he was more generous than all the others. On March 20,
1739, he gave _Alexander's Feast_ with a new Organ Concerto for the
benefit of the Society. On March 28, 1740, he conducted his _Acis and
Galatea_ and his little _Ode on Cecilia's day_. On March 14, 1741, in
his worst days he gave the _Parnasso in festa_, a gala spectacle very
onerous for him with five Solo Concertos by the most celebrated
instrumentalists. Later on he bequeathed L1000 to the Society.
[242] A clumsy friend tried to raise a public charity in an anonymous
letter to the _London Daily Post_ (see above). He made excuses for
Handel, and thus gave the composer the most cruel blow of all. (The
clumsiness of a bear!) This letter is found at the end of Chrysander's
third volume.
[243] On November 4, 1741, he still had time to see, before his
departure, the reopening of the Italian Opera, under the direction of
Galuppi, supported by the English nobility.
[244] Handel wrote the _Messiah_ between August 22 and September 14,
1741. Certain historians have attributed the composition of the
_libretto_ to him. There is no reason for robbing Jennens, a man of
intelligence, author of the excellent poem of _Belshazzar_, of this
honour, and of that shown by the fact that Handel changed none of the
text which Jennens gave him. A letter of March 31, 1745, to a friend
(quoted by Schoelcher) shows that Jennens found the music of the
_Messiah_ hardly worthy of his poem.
[245] The great Musical Society of Dublin, the Philharmonic, gave only
benevolent concerts. For Handel they made a special arrangement. It
suited them that Handel reserved one concert for charity. Handel was
engaged there with gratefulness by promising "some better music." This
"better music" was the _Messiah_. See an article on _Music in Dublin_
from 1730 to 1754 by Dr. W. H. Gratten-Flood, I.M.G. (April-June, 1910).
[246] But not at London, where Handel gave the _Messiah_ only three
times in 1743, twice in 1745, and not again until 1749. The cabals of
the pious tried to stifle it. He was not allowed to put the title of the
oratorio on the bills. It was called A Sacred Oratorio. It was only at
the close of 1750 that the victory of the _Messiah_ was complete. Handel
all his life preserved his connection with charitable objects. He
conducted it once a year for the benefit of the Foundling Hospital. Even
when he was blind he remained faithful to this noble practice, and in
order to better preserve the monopoly of the work for the Hospital he
forbade anyone to publish anything from it before his death.
Since then one knows what a number of editions of the _Messiah_ have
appeared. The Schoelcher collection in the Paris Conservatoire has
brought together sixty-six published between 1763-1869.
[247] The character of Delilah is one of the most complex which Handel
has created, and the parts of Samson and Harapha require exceptional
voices.
[248] Milton's poem had been adapted by Newburgh Hamilton.
[249] The Battle of Dettingen took place on June 27, 1743. Handel had
already finished on July 17 his _Te Deum_, which was solemnly performed
on the following November 27 in Westminster Abbey.
[250] Too slowly for the liking of Handel, who composed it bit by bit as
the acts were sent him. There are five letters from him to Jennens dated
June 9, July 19, August 21, September 13 and October 2, 1744, where he
presses him to send at once the rest of the poem, expressing his own
admiration for the second act, which he said provides new means of
expression and furnishes the opportunity of giving some special ideas,
"finally asking him to cut down the work a little, as it was too long"
(see Schoelcher).
[251] Handel wrote it during the forced pauses in the composition of
_Belshazzar_, and produced it at the commencement of 1745.
[252] The letters quite recently published throw much light on this
troublous period in Handel's life (William Barclay-Squire: Handel in
1745, in the H. Riemann Festschrift, 1909, Leipzig).
[253] Two examples of the song appear in the Schoelcher Collection at
the Paris Conservatoire.
Handel also wrote in July, 1746, for the return of the Duke of
Cumberland, a song on the victory over the rebels by His Royal Highness
the Duke of Cumberland, which was given at Vauxhall (a copy of this song
also appears in the Schoelcher Collection).
[254] Finished in the early days of December, 1745, and given in
February, 1746. The text was founded partly on the Psalms of Milton and
partly on the Bible. Handel inserted in the third part several of the
finest pages from _Israel in Egypt_. In one of the solos the principal
theme of Rule Britannia which was later to be composed by Arne appears.
[255] The poem, very mediocre, was by the Rev. Dr. Thomas Morell, who
was the librettist for the last oratorios of Handel.
[256] It was not one of Handel's oratorios, of which the style was in
the popular vein, and where one finds further grand ensembles and solos
closely connected with the Chorus.
Gluck journeyed to London at the end of 1745. He was then thirty-one
years old. He gave two operas in London, _La Caduta de'Giganti_ and
_Artamene_. (Certain solos from them are to be found in the very rare
collection of _Delizie dell'opere_, Vol. II, London, Walsh, possessed by
the library of the Paris Conservatoire.) This journey of Gluck in
England has no importance in the story of Handel, who showed himself
somewhat scornful in his regard for Gluck's music. But it was not so for
Gluck, who all his life professed the most profound respect for Handel.
He regarded him as his master; he even imagined that he imitated him
(see Michael Kelly: _Reminiscences_, I, 255), and certainly one is
struck by the analogies between certain pages in Handel's oratorios
written from 1744 to 1746 (notably _Hercules_ and _Judas Maccabaeus_) and
the grand operas of Gluck. We find in the two funeral scenes from the
first and second acts of _Judas Maccabaeus_ the pathetic accents and
harmonies of Gluck's _Orpheus_.
[257] After 1747 Handel, abandoning his system of subscriptions, turned
his back on his aristocratic clientele, which had treated him so
shamefully, and opened his theatre to all. It paid him. The middle
classes of London responded to his appeal. After 1748 Handel had full
houses at nearly all his concerts.
[258] Poem founded on the book of Maccabees by Thomas Morell. The first
performance March 23, 1748.
[259] Poem by Thomas Morell, first performances March 9, 1748.
[260] The poem, apparently, by Thomas Morell, notwithstanding its want
of mention in his notes. First performance March 17, 1749.
[261] The Firework Music has been published in Volume XLVII of the
Complete Handel Edition. For the performance on April 27, 1749, the
orchestra numbered one hundred. Schoelcher has published a
correspondence on the subject of this work between Lord Montague,
General-in-chief of the Artillery, and Charles Frederick, Controller of
the King's fireworks. One sees there that very serious differences arose
between Handel and Lord Montague.
[262] The Foundling Hospital was founded in 1739 by an old mariner,
Thomas Coram, "for the maintainance and education of abandoned
children." Handel devoted himself to this institution, and gave
performances of the _Messiah_ annually for its funds. In 1750 he was
elected a Governor of the Hospital, after he had made it a gift of an
organ.