associated with Easter) for the
benefit of London’s Foundling
Hospital, established by Thomas
Coram in 1739. A Yuletide event
thereafter
was
repeated
in
London each year well into the
nineteenth century, by which
time the oratorio had become a
religious landmark in the English-
speaking world. It has not been
out of performance for a single
year since, a record unsurpassed
by any other classical work.
Despite being continually performed for charitable concerts, Handel
would not take a penny from the ticket sales, stating that God had
written the work through him. Upon his death, Handel bequeathed the
manuscript to the Foundling Hospital, which continues to benefit to
this day from performances of Messiah .
Messiah is divided into three parts. Part One: the prophecy of salvation
and the birth of Christ Jesus, Part Two: the crucifixion and death,
and Part Three: the resurrection and the promise of eternal life for
believers.
There is no doubt that Messiah is an enduring and monumental work.
With so many wonderful moments, from ‘And the Glory, the Glory
of the Lord’ as it strides upwards in A major to its home note, to the
ferocious portent of his coming ‘as a refiner’s fire’, and the chorus
delicately sprinkling water upon us in ‘And he shall purify.’ In Part II,
there is no more gut-wrenching portrayal of misery and betrayal than
the aria ‘He was despised and rejected of men.’
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