George Frideric Handel was a German-British composer famous for writing operas, oratorios, anthems, concerti grossi, and organ concerti. He was born in Halle, Germany, and lived in Hamburg and Italy during his early years. In 1712, he moved to London, where he spent most of his career. He became a British citizen in 1727. Handel was influenced by the complex choral music of middle-German tradition and the Italian Baroque style. His music is considered one of the greatest achievements of the "high Baroque" era. He helped develop English oratorio and organ concerto, and brought Italian opera to its highest level. He is widely recognized as one of the most important composers of his time.
Handel started three opera companies to provide Italian opera for the English nobility. In 1737, he had a serious illness and changed his creative direction, focusing more on music for the middle class. After his successful work Messiah in 1742, he stopped writing Italian operas. His orchestral pieces Water Music and Music for the Royal Fireworks are still widely performed. One of his four coronation anthems, Zadok the Priest, has been played at every British coronation since 1727. He died in 1759 at the age of 74, respected and wealthy. He received a state funeral at Westminster Abbey.
Since the mid-20th century, interest in Handel’s music has increased. Musicologist Winton Dean said, "Handel was not only a great composer; he was a dramatic genius of the first order." His music was admired by composers like Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven.
Early years
George Frideric Handel was born in 1685 in Halle, a city in the Duchy of Magdeburg, which was part of Brandenburg–Prussia. His parents were Georg Händel, who was 63 years old, and Dorothea Taust. Dorothea’s father was Georg Taust, a priest, and her mother was Dorothea Cuno, the niece of Johann Olearius. Georg Händel was an important barber-surgeon who worked for the court of Saxe-Weissenfels and the Margraviate of Brandenburg.
Halle was a prosperous city known for its salt-mining industry, trade, and membership in the Hanseatic League. The Margrave of Brandenburg controlled the archepiscopal territories of Mainz, including Magdeburg, and held his court in Halle. This brought many musicians to the city, and even small churches had skilled organists and choirs. The city also had a strong interest in literature and the arts, with plays by Shakespeare performed in theaters as early as the 17th century. However, the Thirty Years’ War caused widespread destruction in Halle, and by the 1680s, the city was poor. After the war, the Duke of Saxony took control of Halle and brought trained musicians from Dresden to his court in Weissenfels.
Despite the city’s artistic and musical culture, these opportunities were mainly for the wealthy. Georg Händel was born at the start of the war and became an apprentice barber at 14 after his father died. At 20, he married the widow of a barber-surgeon in Halle and inherited her practice. He lived a simple, steady life and guided his five children (except his youngest daughter) toward careers in medicine. His wife, Anna, died in 1682, and Georg married again, this time to the daughter of a Lutheran minister, Pastor Georg Taust of the Church of St. Bartholomew in Giebichenstein. George Frideric was the second child of this marriage; the first son was stillborn. Two younger sisters, Dorothea Sophia and Johanna Christiana, were born later.
As a child, Handel attended the gymnasium in Halle, a school where the headmaster, Johann Praetorius, was known to love music. It is unclear how long Handel stayed at the school, but many biographers say his father removed him after learning of his interest in music. Handel’s first biographer, John Mainwaring, wrote that his father strongly opposed any musical education. Mainwaring claimed Georg Händel forbade musical instruments in the home and stopped Handel from visiting places where instruments might be found. However, this did not stop Handel, who secretly obtained a small clavichord and practiced in a room at the top of the house. Some historians doubt this story, but it is clear Handel had some keyboard experience before receiving formal training.
Between the ages of seven and nine, Handel traveled with his father to Weissenfels, where he caught the attention of Duke Johann Adolf I, who became a lifelong supporter. Handel played the organ in the palace chapel, impressing everyone with his skill. The Duke encouraged Georg Händel to give his son musical lessons, and Handel studied with Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow, the organist at Halle’s parish church. Zachow was a respected teacher who taught traditional styles like fugues and counterpoint but also introduced Handel to new musical trends from across Europe.
Zachow shared his large collection of music with Handel, including works by composers from Germany and Italy. Handel practiced the harpsichord, learned the violin and organ, and developed a special interest in the oboe. Zachow also had Handel copy musical scores, a task Handel later described as working “like the devil” at the time. These copies were kept in a notebook Handel used for the rest of his life. The notebook included works by composers such as Johann Krieger, Johann Caspar Kerll, Johann Jakob Froberger, and Georg Muffat, all of whom influenced Handel’s style.
During this time, Zachow sometimes had Handel perform church duties when he was absent. Handel also began composing church services at the age of nine, writing one every week for three years. By the time he was 12 or 13, Handel had surpassed Zachow’s skill and was eager to move to Berlin.
Handel’s father died on February 11, 1697. It was common in Germany for friends and family to write poems for important people, and young Handel contributed a poem dated February 18, signed with his name.
From Hamburg to Italy
Handel's temporary job at Domkirche ended in March 1703. By July 1703, he had moved to Hamburg. Since he did not explain why he left, some historians have guessed why he made the move.
Donald Burrows believes the answer lies in untangling Mainwaring's unclear account of Handel's trip to Berlin. Burrows dates this trip to 1702 or 1703 (after his father's death) and concludes that Handel, through a "friend and relation" at the Berlin court, refused Frederick's offer to help pay for his musical education in Italy. This offer came with the expectation that Handel would become a court musician upon returning. Because of this refusal, Handel could no longer expect special treatment or positions (as a musician, lawyer, or otherwise) in Brandenburg–Prussia. Handel was drawn to secular and dramatic music, influenced by meeting Italian composers Bononcini and Attilio Ariosti and by Telemann. Hamburg, a city with a well-known opera company, became a logical choice for him.
The question remains: why did Handel reject the King's offer, given that Italy was the center of opera? Lang suggests that, influenced by Thomasius, Handel's personality made it difficult for him to be subservient to anyone, even a king. Lang believes Handel could not accept social hierarchies that required him to see himself as a lower class. "What Handel wanted was personal freedom to rise above his provincial background and live a cultured life." Burrows notes that, like his father, Handel could accept royal or aristocratic favors without seeing himself as a servant. Because of his mother's poor financial situation, Handel went to Hamburg to gain experience and support himself.
In 1703, Handel accepted a position as a violinist and harpsichordist in the orchestra of Hamburg's Oper am Gänsemarkt. There, he met composers Johann Mattheson, Christoph Graupner, and Reinhard Keiser. Handel's first two operas, Almira and Nero, were performed in 1705. He later produced Daphne and Florindo, which were performed in 1708.
Mattheson was a close friend of Handel but nearly killed him during a sudden argument during a performance of Mattheson's opera Die unglückselige Kleopatra, Königin von Ägypten in 1704. Handel was saved when a large button on his clothing deflected Mattheson's sword. The two later reconciled and remained in contact for life. After Mattheson's death, he translated John Mainwaring's biography of Handel into German and published it in Hamburg in 1761 at his own expense.
According to Mainwaring, in 1706, Handel traveled to Italy at the invitation of Ferdinando de' Medici. Other sources mention that Gian Gastone de' Medici, whom Handel had met in Hamburg between 1703 and 1704, invited him. Ferdinando, who loved opera, aimed to make Florence Italy's musical capital by attracting top talents. In Italy, Handel met librettist Antonio Salvi, with whom he later worked. Handel then went to Rome, where opera was temporarily banned in the Papal States, and composed sacred music for the Roman clergy. His famous Dixit Dominus (1707) was written during this time. He also composed pastoral-style cantatas for musical events at the palace of Duchess Aurora Sanseverino (called "Donna Laura" by Mainwaring), an influential patron from Naples, and for cardinals Pietro Ottoboni, Benedetto Pamphili, and Carlo Colonna. Two oratorios, La resurrezione and Il trionfo del tempo, were performed privately for Ruspoli and Ottoboni in 1709 and 1710, respectively. Rodrigo, his first all-Italian opera, was performed in Florence's Cocomero theatre in 1707. Agrippina was first performed in 1709 at Teatro San Giovanni Grisostomo in Venice, owned by the Grimanis. The opera, with a libretto by Cardinal Vincenzo Grimani, ran for 27 nights. The audience was deeply impressed by the grandeur of Handel's style and applauded him, calling him "Il caro Sassone" ("the dear Saxon," referencing his origins).
In London
In June 1710, Handel became the music director for George, the Elector of Hanover, but left at the end of the year. He may have been invited by Charles Montagu, a former ambassador in Venice, to visit England. On his way to London, Handel visited Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici and her husband in Düsseldorf. His opera Rinaldo, based on a poem by Torquato Tasso, was very successful, even though it was written quickly and used parts from his earlier works. This opera includes one of Handel’s favorite songs, Cara sposa, amante cara, and the well-known Lascia ch'io pianga.
Handel returned to Halle twice to attend his sister’s wedding and the baptism of her daughter, but he decided to stay in England permanently in 1712. In the summer of 1713, he lived at the estate of Mr. Mathew Andrews in Barn Elms, Surrey. Queen Anne gave him £200 a year after he composed The Utrecht Te Deum and Jubilate, which was first performed in 1713.
One of Handel’s most important supporters was the 3rd Earl of Burlington and 4th Earl of Cork, a wealthy member of an Anglo-Irish aristocratic family. While living in the Earl’s mansion, Handel wrote Amadigi di Gaula, a magical opera about a damsel in distress, based on a tragedy by Antoine Houdar de la Motte.
Handel did not write any operas for five years because he did not yet see opera as a complete and organized form. In July 1717, his Water Music was performed more than three times on the River Thames for King George I and his guests. It is said that this music helped improve the relationship between Handel and the king, who had been upset by Handel leaving his Hanover position.
In 1717, Handel became the house composer at Cannons in Middlesex, where he began creating choral music that would later become the Chandos Anthems. Romain Rolland noted that these anthems were like early versions of Handel’s later oratorios, much like Italian cantatas were to his operas. Another work he wrote for the 1st Duke of Chandos, the owner of Cannons, was Acis and Galatea, which was performed more than any other of Handel’s works during his lifetime. The musicologist Winton Dean said that the music in Acis and Galatea is powerful and unforgettable.
In 1719, the Duke of Chandos became one of Handel’s important supporters and a major investor in the Royal Academy of Music, a new opera company. However, his support declined after he lost money in the South Sea Bubble, a major financial crisis in 1720. Handel had invested in the South Sea Company in 1716 when its shares were cheap and sold them before the bubble burst. In 1720, Handel also invested in the Royal African Company, which traded in enslaved people. The music historian David Hunter noted that 32% of the Royal Academy of Music’s subscribers or their family members had investments in the Royal African Company.
In May 1719, the 1st Duke of Newcastle, the Lord Chamberlain, asked Handel to find new singers. Handel traveled to Dresden to see the opera Teofane by Antonio Lotti and hired members of the cast for the Royal Academy of Music, which was founded by aristocrats to ensure a steady supply of baroque opera. Handel may have invited John Smith, his former student in Halle, and his son Johann Christoph Schmidt to join him as a secretary and assistant. By 1723, Handel moved into a Georgian house at 25 Brook Street, which he rented for the rest of his life. This house, where he rehearsed, copied music, and sold tickets, is now the Handel House Museum. Between 1724 and 1725, Handel wrote three successful operas: Giulio Cesare, Tamerlano, and Rodelinda. His operas include many da capo arias, such as Svegliatevi nel core. After composing Silete venti, Handel focused on opera and stopped writing cantatas. Scipio, from which the British Grenadier Guards’ slow march is taken, was performed as a temporary replacement while waiting for the arrival of Faustina Bordoni.
In 1727, Handel was asked to write four anthems for the coronation of King George II. One of these, Zadok the Priest, has been played at every British coronation since. The lyrics of Zadok the Priest come from the King James Bible. In 1728, John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera, a satire of the Italian opera style Handel had popularized, premiered at Lincoln’s Inn Fields Theatre and ran for 62 performances, the longest run in theatre history at that time. After nine years, the Royal Academy of Music stopped operating, but Handel soon started a new company.
The Queen’s Theatre at the Haymarket (now His Majesty’s Theatre), built in 1705 by John Vanbrugh, became an opera house. Between 1711 and 1739, more than 25 of Handel’s operas premiered there. In 1729, Handel became a co-manager of the theatre with John James Heidegger.
Handel traveled to Italy to find new singers and composed seven more operas, including the comic masterpiece Partenope and the magical opera Orlando. After writing two successful English oratorios, Esther and Deborah, he invested again in the South Sea Company. He revised Acis and Galatea, which became his most successful work ever. Handel struggled to compete with the Opera of the Nobility, which hired musicians like Johann Adolph Hasse, Nicolo Porpora, and the famous castrato Farinelli. Strong support from Frederick, Prince of Wales, caused conflicts within the royal family. In March 1734, Handel composed a wedding anthem, This is the day which the Lord hath made, and a serenata, Parnasso in Festa, for Anne, Princess Royal.
Despite the challenges from the Opera of the Nobility, Handel’s neighbor in Brook Street, Mary Delany, reported that Handel was in good spirits at a party she hosted on April 12, 1734.
In 1733, the Earl of Essex received a letter stating, “Handel became so arbitrary a prince, that the Town murmurs.” The board of investors expected Handel to retire when his contract ended, but he
Later years
In 1749, Handel composed Music for the Royal Fireworks. Twelve thousand people attended the first performance. In 1750, he arranged a performance of Messiah to support the Foundling Hospital, a children’s home in London. The performance was a great success and led to annual concerts that continued for the rest of his life. Because of his support, Handel was made a governor of the Hospital the day after his first concert. He left a copy of Messiah to the institution when he died. His work with the Foundling Hospital is remembered today with a permanent exhibition at London’s Foundling Museum, which also holds the Gerald Coke Handel Collection. In addition to the Foundling Hospital, Handel also helped a charity that supported poor musicians and their families.
In August 1750, while traveling from Germany to London, Handel was seriously injured in a carriage accident near The Hague and Haarlem in the Netherlands. In 1751, one of his eyes began to fail due to a cataract. A doctor named John Taylor performed surgery, but it did not improve his eyesight and may have made it worse. By 1752, Handel was completely blind. He died in 1759 at his home in Brook Street at the age of 74. The last performance he attended was of Messiah. Handel was buried in Westminster Abbey. More than three thousand people attended his funeral, which received full state honors.
Handel never married and kept his personal life private. His first will left most of his money to his niece, Johanna. However, four changes to his will later distributed much of his estate to other relatives, servants, friends, and charities.
Handel owned an art collection that was sold after his death in 1760. The auction catalog listed about seventy paintings and ten prints. Other paintings had been left to others before his death.
Works
George Frideric Handel composed many types of music, including 42 operas, 24 oratorios, over 120 cantatas, trios, and duets, numerous arias, odes, and serenatas, solo and trio sonatas, 18 concerti grossi, and 12 organ concertos. His most famous work, the oratorio Messiah, which includes the "Hallelujah" chorus, is one of the most well-known pieces in choral music. The Lobkowicz Palace in Prague keeps a copy of Messiah that Mozart owned, including his handwritten notes. Works with opus numbers, such as the Organ concertos Op. 4 and Op. 7, and the Concerti grossi Op. 3 and Op. 6, were published during Handel's lifetime. The Concerti grossi include an earlier organ concerto titled The Cuckoo and the Nightingale, where the sound of birds is mimicked on the organ. His 16 keyboard suites, especially The Harmonious Blacksmith, are also notable.
The first list of Handel's works was included in an appendix of Mainwaring's Memoirs. Between 1787 and 1797, Samuel Arnold created a 180-volume collection of Handel's music, but it was incomplete. Another incomplete collection was made by the English Handel Society between 1843 and 1858, founded by Sir George Macfarren.
The Händel-Gesellschaft ("Handel Society") edition, a 105-volume collection of Handel's works, was published from 1858 to 1902, largely due to Friedrich Chrysander's efforts. For modern performances, the way the bass line is played follows 19th-century practices. Vocal scores from this edition were published by Novello in London, though some, like the score for Samson, are missing parts.
The Hallische Händel-Ausgabe edition, started in 1955 in Halle, East Germany, was initially not a critical edition but later changed to one after criticism of its early volumes, which lacked detailed source information. Due to Cold War challenges, the edition had errors and incomplete research. In 1985, a committee was formed to improve its quality. After Germany reunited in 1990, the edition's quality improved significantly.
Between 1978 and 1986, Bernd Baselt, a German scholar, created a catalog of Handel's works titled Händel-Werke-Verzeichnis. This catalog is widely used today, assigning each work a unique number, such as "HWV 56" for Messiah.
Legacy
George Frideric Handel’s music was collected and preserved by two men: Sir Samuel Hellier, a country gentleman whose music collection became the core of the Shaw–Hellier Collection, and Granville Sharp, an abolitionist. A catalog from a National Portrait Gallery exhibition celebrating the 300th anniversary of Handel’s birth described these two men as individuals from the late 1700s who left clear proof of how they enjoyed music. Handel became a famous figure in Britain because of his English oratorios, such as Messiah and Solomon, his coronation anthems, and other works like Water Music and Music for the Royal Fireworks. He was also featured in a BBC series titled The Birth of British Music: Handel – The Conquering Hero.
After Handel’s death, his Italian operas were no longer performed, except for parts like the aria "Ombra mai fu" from Serse. His oratorios continued to be performed but were later thought to need updates. Mozart arranged German versions of Messiah and other works. For much of the 1800s and early 1900s, especially in English-speaking countries, Handel’s reputation was based on his English oratorios, which were often performed by groups of amateur singers at serious events. In 1859, the 100th anniversary of his death, Messiah was performed at The Crystal Palace with 2,765 singers and 460 musicians playing for about 10,000 people.
In recent decades, Handel’s secular cantatas and works like "secular oratorios" or "concert operas" have been rediscovered. Examples include Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day (1739) and Ode for the Birthday of Queen Anne (1713). For secular oratorios, Handel used themes from classical mythology, creating works like Acis and Galatea (1719), Hercules (1745), and Semele (1744). These works share similarities with his sacred oratorios, especially in the way the English texts are sung. They also have the emotional and dramatic qualities of his Italian operas and are sometimes performed as full operas.
Many composers have praised Handel. Johann Sebastian Bach tried to meet Handel but failed. Mozart once said, "Handel understands emotion better than anyone. When he chooses, he strikes like a thunderbolt." Beethoven called Handel "the master of us all… the greatest composer that ever lived" and said he would kneel before Handel’s tomb. Beethoven especially admired the simplicity and popularity of Handel’s music.
Since 1831, scholars have studied how Handel reused music from other composers. A musicologist named Richard Taruskin wrote in 2005 that Handel "seems to have been the champion of all parodists," meaning he reused his own and others’ music in large numbers and with great accuracy. Composers whose music Handel reused include Alessandro Stradella, Gottlieb Muffat, Alessandro Scarlatti, Domenico Scarlatti, Giacomo Carissimi, Georg Philipp Telemann, Carl Heinrich Graun, Leonardo Vinci, Jacobus Gallus, Francesco Antonio Urio, Reinhard Keiser, Francesco Gasparini, Giovanni Bononcini, William Boyce, Henry Lawes, Michael Wise, Agostino Steffani, Franz Johann Habermann, and others.
In 1985, John H. Roberts wrote that Handel reused music more often than most composers of his time, even drawing criticism from some contemporaries. Roberts suggested reasons for this, such as Handel’s desire to make his music sound more modern or his difficulty creating original ideas. However, he argued that this does not reduce Handel’s importance, which should be judged by the quality of his music, not his methods.
After Handel’s death, many composers created works inspired by his music. For example, Louis Spohr’s Symphony No. 6, Op. 116, includes melodies from Messiah. Beethoven wrote 12 variations on a melody from Judas Maccabaeus and composed The Consecration of the House influenced by Handel. Mauro Giuliani wrote variations on Handel’s harpsichord suite for guitar. Johannes Brahms used a theme from Handel’s harpsichord suite in his Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel, Op. 24. Other composers, such as Félix-Alexandre Guilmant, Philippe Gaubert, Luis Gianneo, Percy Grainger, and Arnold Schoenberg, also created works based on Handel’s music.
In the Lutheran Calendar of Saints, Handel and Bach share the same date, July 28, with Heinrich Schütz. They are also honored in the calendar of the United Methodist Church. The Presbyterian Church (USA) commemorates Handel on April 20.
In 1942, a British film titled The Great Mr. Handel, directed by Norman Walker and starring Wilfrid Lawson, was made at Denham Studios by the Rank Organisation in Technicolor. Handel is also the main character in the television films God Rot Tunbridge Wells! (1985) and Handel’s Last Chance (1996), as well as the stage play All the Angels (2015). He was portrayed as an antagonist in the film Farinelli (1994) by Jeroen Krabbé.