BaL 23.03.13 - Handel's Suites for keyboard HWV 426-33

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

I suppose you could have vibrato on a clavichord.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

As an aside, I notice that the BBC website and CD Review are promoting these as "Handel's Eight Great Suites". Is this of their own invention or is there a precedent for this accolade?

[Nick Armstrong]

I suppose you could have vibrato on a clavichord.

I'm sure you could do all sorts of things on a clavichord if you were light enough!

A grand piano might be more resilient though

[MickyD]

As an aside, I notice that the BBC website and CD Review are promoting these as "Handel's Eight Great Suites". Is this of their own invention or is there a precedent for this accolade?

Yes, these 8 are generally known as the "great" ones - I think there are in total some 16 suites, but the latter are scattered works, I believe due to difficulties in grouping them from confusing original sources. Maybe someone can be more precise about this. In any case, we are still waiting for a really complete recording.

[vinteuil]

As an aside, I notice that the BBC website and CD Review are promoting these as "Handel's Eight Great Suites". Is this of their own invention or is there a precedent for this accolade?

In the four Collections of his keyboard works published in Handel's lifetime, the First Collection of 1720 contains the "Eight Great Suites". The Second and Third Collections (published without Handel's consent or supervision) contain eight other suites and other pieces.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Many thanks for the informative replies. I feel I should have known more about them, as I played a movement from the D minor Suite for my Grade 8 Piano, and the whole of the G minor as part of my degree recital.

[Bryn]

I suppose you could have vibrato on a clavichord.

Fit a grand with a Moog Piano Bar and you can do a lot more than merely apply vibrato.

[waldo]

According to my Bible, The All Music Guide (maybe reliable, maybe not......), only two sets were published in Handel's lifetime. One in 1720 (the eight "great" suites), one in 1733 (nine). The 1720 lot were only published to counter the illegal publication of the same works in the Netherlands. Handel, or so it was claimed, didn't really intend to publish any of them. They were primarily for teaching or showing off to his royal mates; too inconsistent, really, to sell to the public at large. The 1733 set may or may not have been published with his approval and certainly contained at least one movement by another (unnamed) composer. In total, he is thought to have set down at least 25 suites.

"Great" suites? That's news to me, but if that's what they are, then so be it.

[BBMmk2]

Fit a grand with a Moog Piano Bar and you can do a lot more than merely apply vibrato.

Im'm surprised that aka Calum da jazbo or teamsaint havnt made a comment :)

[visualnickmos]

Not MORE baroque, surely!!!!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

"Great" suites? That's news to me, but if that's what they are, then so be it.

I queried this too, but on returning to the two sheet music volumes I have (Augener and Associated Board) I saw that the latter was labelled in this way, but I'd never noticed.
I sat down and tried some of them after years of gathering dust, and the difference between the two editions was considerable. The AB version was the more authentic of the two, but the Augener was more pianistic, with the ornaments incorporated into the text. Reading the AB publication was like walking across a minefield, such was the visual fussiness of the ornamentation/suggestions. The AB editions are becoming more and more like this.

[aeolium]

I have a recording by Laurence Cummings made on a harpsichord in the Handel House in Brook Street (that harpsichord a copy by Bruce Kennedy of one originally in the House and reportedly used by the composer). I like the performances though I haven't heard many of the ones in EA's list to compare them with (though I have the Richter/Gavrilov set which doesn't work for me). It's superb music, imo.

[MickyD]

This thread reminds me of a curious fact I learned many years ago about the great Gustav Leonhardt - he said that he never performed any Handel as he just couldn't relate to the composer. How any baroque scholar or performer could say that was a mystery to me.

[waldo]

How any baroque scholar or performer could say that was a mystery to me.

I think this was a fairly common position for many years. Only in recent decades has Handel been re-recognised as a truly great composer.

I didn't listen to him myself for a long time because my music teachers (at school) had told me not to bother. Bach, yes - a God. But not Handel: he was just a second-rate, plagiaristic magpie. I even went around saying this myself.

Then someone at work handed me a copy of Saul...........

[doversoul1]

This thread reminds me of a curious fact I learned many years ago about the great Gustav Leonhardt - he said that he never performed any Handel as he just couldn't relate to the composer. How any baroque scholar or performer could say that was a mystery to me.

Well, you could, sort of, see that, couldn’t you?. Leonhardt was the picture of an austere spirit*, in the best of sense, and austere is probably the last adjective we’d (I'd) use to describe Handel’s music.

*musically, that is.