BaL 16.04.22 - Handel: Messiah

[mikealdren]

Sargent recorded the work at least three times with the Huddersfield Choral Society. The 78rpm and the stereo versions are the ones currently available? But the mono only LP version appears nowhere these days.
Mackerras’s allegedly Mozart version, with the Huddersfield CS, sung in English, is essentially a Mozart/Prout/Sargent rehash, making the traditional cuts and using Handel’s version of The Trumpet Shall Sound.

It's the 78 version that I have.

[Pulcinella]

Started streaming the ECO/Mackerras version this afternoon, but gave up as I really couldn't cope with the ornamentation.

Alpie: hope you're not disappointed with your purchase. I'll compensate with a pint or two should we ever get to meet up.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Started streaming the ECO/Mackerras version this afternoon, but gave up as I really couldn't cope with the ornamentation.

Alpie: hope you're not disappointed with your purchase. I'll compensate with a pint or two should we ever get to meet up.

Ornamentation can indeed be annoying on a recording, as the spontaneity is lost after the first hearing.
Also, one wonders what the composers really thought of the singers taking liberties with their music. If I’d written a minim - now or 275 years ago - I wouldn’t necessarily be pleased if someone else decided it should be a wobbly trill, have an added appoggiaturas, or other presumptuous alterations to my score.
And here’s the rub: if a harpsichordist decided to fill in harmonies, that would be okay; but if Mozart added them orchestrally (superbly, as he did) that was an unforgivable sin, worthy only of scorn.

[gradus]

'Sell your car in order to buy it -there's nowhere to park in any case nowadays' or words to that effect in the original Gramophone review reflect my own sentiments about Beecham's wonderful recording. A close second is Sargent with the RLPO and Huddersfield Choral Society. I loathe those small-scale slick performances that were fashionable at one time - Hallelujah should lift the roof imv.

[Lordgeous]

Do we know if Handel would have relished larger forces if he'd had the choice?

[cat]

Do we know if Handel would have relished larger forces if he'd had the choice?

I guess the answer is similar to "would Bach have relished the piano over the harpsichord" and is probably something like "maybe, but if he'd composed with that in mind we wouldn't have the works we have now but something different".

[Bryn]

Do we know if Handel would have relished larger forces if he'd had the choice?

The music for the Royal Fireworks suggests the answer is yes:

24 oboes, 12 bassoons and a contrabassoon (originally serpent, later scratched out), nine natural trumpets, nine natural horns, three pairs of kettledrums, and side drums which were given only the direction to play ad libitum.

:

[Pulcinella]

Do we know if Handel would have relished larger forces if he'd had the choice?

Was the venue for the first performance already known when he was composing the work?
That might have put a constraint on the forces used/available.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I guess the answer is similar to "would Bach have relished the piano over the harpsichord" and is probably something like "maybe, but if he'd composed with that in mind we wouldn't have the works we have now but something different".

Perhaps not really. Bach wasn’t particularly interested in the newly invented pianoforte, so he clearly didn’t relish. On the other hand it’s unlikely that he’d have composed very differently. His music was very much in the same style, whether he was writing for voices, the keyboard or orchestral instruments. Perhaps the ornamentation would have been reduced on later pianofortes, but not those early ones.

There’s a difference between Bach and Handel when it comes to the size of forces desired. Handel employed larger forces when practical, though Bryn’s example of the Royal Fireworks Music was intended for outdoor use, where extra weight would have been necessary.
Bach used very small choral forces, though that may have been due to economic factors.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Started streaming the ECO/Mackerras version this afternoon, but gave up as I really couldn't cope with the ornamentation.

Alpie: hope you're not disappointed with your purchase. I'll compensate with a pint or two should we ever get to meet up.

That sounds tempting.

The 2CD set arrived this morning. The ornaments may well have been part of the performing culture at the time (whether the composer liked it or not), but on a recording that’s going to be played many times over, it can indeed become irritating.

I was surprised that the CD change occurs immediately after “Surely, He hath borne our griefs”, which should be followed (attacca) by “And with his stripes”. Perhaps at time of the CD release, it was seen as unacceptable to exceed the 80 minute limit.

[ARBurton]

I have too many Messiahs but favourites are Hogwood, Sargent`s last one, Christophers on Hyperion, and best of all McCreesh. But I also wouldn`t want to be without a Christophers recording of the Mozart version which the BBC Music Magazine put out.

[BBMmk2]

Congratulations EA! What a mammoth task! I pity Jeremy Summerly here!

[gurnemanz]

Congratulations EA! What a mammoth task! I pity Jeremy Summerly here!

Nearly 300 considered here

I shall listen with interest but suspect that with Sargent, Christie, McCreesh and Somary my bases are covered.

[cloughie]

Nearly 300 considered here

I shall listen with interest but suspect that with Sargent, Christie, McCreesh and Somary my bases are covered.

That list is one of excess - I think, like you, a few will cover most bases and styles!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Nearly 300 considered here

Wow! What a list!

Sargent's 1954 recording appears to have been omitted. It had almost identical performers to the later 1959 stereo version. The only significant difference was the change of bass soloist - Norman Walker in 1954; James Milligan in 1959.