Handel Part 6

The orchestral music of Handel comprises twelve _Concerti Grossi_ (1740), the six Oboe Concertos (1734), the Symphonies from his operas, oratorios, and his open-air music--Water-Music (1715 or 1717), Firework Music (1749),--and _Concerti_ for two horns.

Although Handel was in art a visualist, and though his music had a highly descriptive and evocatory power, he only made a very restrained use of instrumental tone-colour.[383] However, he showed on occasion a refined intelligence in its use. The two oratorios written at Rome when he found himself in the society of the Cardinal Ottoboni, and his great _virtuoso_ works, _The Triumph of Time_ and _The Resurrection_ of 1708, have a fine and well-varied orchestration.[384] In London he was one of the first to introduce the use of the horn into the orchestra of the opera.[385] "He was the first," says Volbach, "to a.s.sert the expressive personality of the violoncello."[386] From the viola he knew how to secure many curious effects of indefinite and disquieting half-tones,[387] he gave to the ba.s.soons a lugubrious and fantastic character,[388] he experimented with new instruments, small[389] and great,[390] he used the drum (_tambour_) solo in a dramatic fas.h.i.+on for Jupiter's oath in _Semele_. For special situations, by instrumental tone-colours, he secures effects not only of dramatic expression, but also of exotism and local colour. It is so in the two scenes from the two Cleopatras, _Giulio Cesare_ (1724)[391] and _Alexander Balus_ (1748).

But great painter as Handel was he did not work so much through the brilliancy, variety, and novelty of his tone-colours as by the beauty of his designs, and his effects of light and shade. With a voluntarily restrained palette, and by satisfying himself with the sober colours of the strings, he yet was able to produce surprising and thrilling effects. Volbach has shown[392] that he had less recourse to the contrast and mixing of instruments than to the division of the same family of instruments into different groups. In the introductory piece movement to his second _Esther_ (1732) the violins are divided into five groups;[393] in _The Resurrection_ (1708), into four divisions;[394] the violas are sometimes divided into two, the second being reinforced by the third violin, or by the violoncellos.[395] On the other hand, Handel, when he considered it advisable, reduced his instrumental forces by suppressing the viola and the second violin, whose places were taken by the clavecin. All his orchestral art is in the true instinct of balance and economy, which, with the most restricted means in managing a few colours, yet knows how to obtain as powerful impressions as our musicians of to-day, with their crowded palette.[396] Nothing, then, is more important, if we wish to render this music truly, than the avoidance of upsetting the equilibrium of the various sections of the orchestra under the pretext of enriching it and bringing it up to date.

The worse fault is to deprive it, by a useless surplus of tone-colours, of that suppleness and subtlety of nuance which is its princ.i.p.al charm.

One is p.r.o.ne to accept too readily the idea, that expressive nuance is a privilege of the modern musical art, and that Handel's orchestra knew only the great theatrical contrasts between force and sweetness, or loudness and softness. It is nothing of the kind. The range of Handel's nuances is extremely varied. One finds with him the _pianissimo_, the piano, the _mezzo piano_, the _mezzo forte_, _un poco piu F_, _un poco F_, _forte_, _fortissimo_. We never find the orchestral _crescendo_ and _decrescendo_, which hardly appears marked expressly until the time of Jommelli,[397] and the school of Mannheim; but there is no doubt that it was practised long before it was marked in the music.[398] The President of Brosses wrote in 1739 from Rome: "The voices, like the violins, used with light and shade, with unconscious swelling of sound, which augments the force from note to note, even to a very high degree, since its use as a nuance is extremely sweet and touching." And endless examples occur in Handel of long _crescendi_ and _diminuendi_ without its expression being marked in the scores.[399] Another kind of _crescendo_ and _diminuendo_ on the same note was very common in the time of Handel, and his friend, Geminiani, helped to set the fas.h.i.+on. Volbach, and with him Hugo Riemann,[400] has shown that Geminiani used in the later editions of his first Violin Sonatas in 1739, and in his Violin School in 1751, the two following signs:

Swelling the sound [==]

Diminis.h.i.+ng (falling) the sound [=/=]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

As Geminiani explains it, "The sound ought to commence softly, and should swell out in a gradual fas.h.i.+on to about half its value, then it should diminish to the end. The movement of the bow should continue without interruption."

It happens thus, that by a refinement of expression, which became a mannerism of the Mannheim school, but which also became a source of powerful contrast with the Beethovenians, the swelling stopped short of its aim, and was followed instead by a sudden piano, as in the following example from the Trio Sonatas of Geminiani.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

It is more than probable that the virtuoso players of Handel's orchestra also used this means of expression,[401] though we need not a.s.sume that Handel used them as abundantly as Geminiani or as the Mannheim players, whose taste had become doubtless a little affected and exaggerated. But what is certain is that with him, as with Geminiani, and indeed with all the great artists of his time, especially with the Italians and their followers, music was a real discourse, and ought to be rendered with inflections as free and as varied as natural speech.[402]

[Ill.u.s.tration: HANDEL DIRECTING AN ORATORIO.

Handel is seen (on the left) seated at a cembalo with two keyboards in the midst of his musicians. At his right hand he has the "concertino"

group (consisting of the 'cellist, two violinists and two flautists). On his near left (quite close to the cembalo) are the vocal soloists. The rest of the instrumentalists are out of his sight.]

How was it possible to realise all the suppleness and subtleties of elocution on the orchestra? To understand this it is necessary to examine the disposition and placing of the orchestra of that time. It was not, as with us, centralised under the control of a single conductor. Thus, as Seiffert tells us,[403] in Handel's time it was the principle of decentralisation which ruled. The choruses had their leaders, who listened to the organ, from which they took their cue, and so sustained the voices. The orchestra was divided into three sections, after the Italian method. Firstly, the _Concertino_, comprising a first and a second violin, and a solo violoncello; secondly, the _Concerto Grosso_, comprising the instrumental choir; thirdly, the _Ripienists_ strengthening the _Grosso_.[404]

A picture in the British Museum, representing Handel in the midst of his musicians, depicts the composer seated at the clavier (a cembalo with two keyboards, of which the lid is raised). He is surrounded by the violoncellist (placed at his right-hand side), two violins and two flutes, which are placed just before him, under his eye. The solo singers are also near him, on his left, quite close to the clavecin. The rest of the instrumentalists are behind him, out of his sight. Thus his directions and his glances would control the _Concertino_, who would transmit in their turn the chief conductor's wishes to the _Concerto Grosso_, and they in their turn to the _Ripienists_. In place of the quasi-military discipline of modern orchestras, controlled under the baton of a chief conductor, the different bodies of the Handelian orchestra governed one another with elasticity, and it was the incisive rhythm of the little _Cembalo_ which put the whole ma.s.s into motion.

Such a method avoided the mechanical stiffness of our performances. The danger was rather a certain wobbling without the powerful and infectious will-power of a chief such as Handel, and without the close sympathy of thought which was established between him and his capable sub-conductors of the _Concertino_ and of the _Grosso_.

It is this elasticity which should be aimed at in the instrumental works of Handel when they are executed nowadays.[405]

We will first take his _Concerti Grossi_.[406] None of his works are more celebrated and less understood. Handel attached to them a particular value, for he published them himself by subscription, a means which was usual in his day, but which he himself never adopted except under exceptional circ.u.mstances.

One knows that the kind of _Concerti Grossi_, which consists chiefly in a dialogue between a group of solo instrumentalists (the _Concertino_) and the full body of instruments (_Concerto Grosso_), to which is added the cembalo,[407] was, if not invented, at least carried to its perfection and rendered cla.s.sical by Corelli.[408] The works of Corelli, aided by the efforts of his followers, had become widely known in Europe. Geminiani introduced them into England,[409] and without doubt Handel did not hesitate to profit by the example of Geminiani, who was his friend;[410] but it is much more natural to think that he learnt the _Concerto Grosso_, at its source at Rome, from Corelli himself during his sojourn there in 1708. Several of his Concertos in his Opus 3[411]

date from 1710, 1716, 1722. The same feature shows itself right up to the time of his apprentices.h.i.+p at Hamburg: in any case he might have already known the Corellian style, thanks to the propaganda of George m.u.f.fat, who spread this style very early in Germany.[412] After Corelli, Locatelli,[413] and especially Vivaldi,[414] have singularly transformed the _Concerto Grosso_ by giving it the free character of programme music[415] and by turning it resolutely towards the form of the Sonata in three parts. But when the works of Vivaldi were played in London in 1723, and the works which aroused such a general enthusiasm became thoroughly known to Handel, it was always to Corelli that he gave the preference, and he was very conservative in certain ways even about him.

The form of his Concerto, of which the princ.i.p.al movements varied from four to six, oscillated between the Suite and the Sonata, and even glanced towards the symphonic overture. It is this for which the theorists blame him, and it is this for which I praise him. For he does not seek to impose a uniform cast on his thoughts, but leaves it open to himself to fas.h.i.+on the form as he requires, and the framework varies accordingly, following his inclinations from day to day. The spontaneity of his thought, which has already been shown by the extreme rapidity with which the _Concerti_ were composed--each in a single day at a single sitting, and many each week[416]--const.i.tutes the great charm of these works. They are, in the words of Kretzschmar, grand impression pictures, translated into a form, at the same time precise and supple, in which the least change of emotion can make itself easily felt. Truly they are not all of equal value. Their conception itself, which depended in a way on mere momentary inspiration, is the explanation of this extreme inequality. One ought to acknowledge here that the Seventh Concerto, for example (the one in B flat major), and the last three have but a moderate interest.[417] They are amongst those least played; but to be quite just we must pay homage to these masterpieces, and especially to the Second Concerto in F major, which is like a Beethovenian concerto: for we find there some of the spirit of the Bonn master. For Kretzschmar the ensemble calls to mind a beautiful autumn day--the morning, where the rising sun pierces its way through the clouds--the afternoon, the joyful walk, the rest in the forest, and finally the happy and belated return. It is difficult in fact not to have natural scenes brought before one's eyes in hearing these works.

The first _Andante Larghetto_, which predicts, at times, the Pastoral Symphony of Beethoven, is a reverie on a beautiful summer's day. The spirit lulls itself with nature's murmur, becomes intoxicated with it, and goes to rest. The tonality rocks between F major to B flat major and G minor. To render this piece well it is necessary to give the time plenty of play, often r.e.t.a.r.ding it, and following the composer's reverie in a spirit of soft leisurely abandon.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Andante larghetto_]

The _Allegro_ in D minor which follows is a spirited and delicate little play, a dialogue leaping from the two solo violins of the _Concerto_, then on to the _Concertino_ and the _Grosso_ in turn. There, also, certain pa.s.sages in the Ba.s.s, robust, rollicking, and rustic, again bring to mind the Pastoral Symphony.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Allegro_]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Largo_]

The third movement, a _Largo_ in B flat major, is one of the most intimate of Handel's instrumental pages. After seven bars of _Largo_, in which the _Concertino_ alternates dreamily with the _Tutti_, two bars _adagio_, languorously drawn out, cause the reverie to glide into a sort of ecstasy,

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Adagio_]

then a _larghetto andante e piano_ breathes out a tender and melancholy song.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Larghetto andante_]

The _Largo_ is resumed. There is in this little poem a melancholy which seems to revive Handel's personal remembrances.--The _allegro ma non troppo_ with which it finishes is, on the contrary, of a jovial feeling, entirely Beethovenish; it sings joyfully as it bounds along in well-marked three-four time, with a _pizzicato_-like rhythm.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Allegro ma non troppo_]

In the middle of this march a phrase occurs on the two violins of the _Concertino_ which is like a hymn of reverent and tender grat.i.tude.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

The Fourth Concerto in A minor is not less intimate with its _Larghetto affettuoso_, which ought to be played with the _rubato_, _rallentando_ and short pauses--its _allegro_ fugue, which spreads out and over-shadows all by its powerful tread--and after a _Largo_ of antique graveness the _allegro_ three-four which finishes is the veritable last movement of the Beethoven sonata, romantic, capricious, pa.s.sionate, and more and more unrestrained as it approaches the end, _accelerando_ nearly _prestissimo_,--inebriated.[418]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Allegro_]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

But one ought to know especially the Sixth Concerto in G minor, the most celebrated of all on account of its magnificent Musette. It opens with a beautiful _Larghetto_, full of that melancholy which is one of the dominant sentiments with Handel, and one of the least observed by most people: melancholy that is, in the sense of the _Malinconia_ of Durer, or of Beethoven--less agitated, but still profound. We have already encountered it in the Second, in the Third, and in the Fourth Concerto.[419] Here it is found in an elegiac monologue, punctuated by pedal points;

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Largo affettuoso_]

then in the dialogues of the _Concertino_ and of the _Tutti_ responding, like the groups of the ancient cla.s.sical chorus. The _allegro ma non troppo_ fugue which follows it, on a twisting chromatic theme, is of the same sombre colour. But it is the l.u.s.ty march of the disciplined fugue which dispels the fantastic shadows.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Allegro ma non troppo_]

Then comes the _Larghetto_, three-four time in E flat major, which Handel calls a Musette, and which is one of the most delightful dreams of pastoral happiness.[420] A whole day of poetic and capricious events gradually unrolls itself over the beautiful echoing refrain,

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Larghetto_]

then the movement slackens, nearly going to sleep, then presses forward again, acquiring a strong, joyous rhythm, a pulsating dance of robust youths, full of bounding life.

In the midst of this picture an episode, rustic and frolicsome, is introduced.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Un poco piu allegro_]

[Ill.u.s.tration]