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Overview
Handel is one of the most remarkable figures in the history of western music. His compositions form one of the peaks of creative achievement in the Baroque period, and cover a remarkable range: full-scale Italian operas and English oratorios (including Messiah), but also shorter works such as the Water Music and the Coronation Anthem Zadok the Priest. His compositional processes were often complex, but could result in accessible and memorable 'hit tunes', such as the aria that subsequently became famous as 'Handel's Largo'.
His life and career were as remarkable as his music. Born in Germany to a family that reputedly tried to discourage his initial interest in music, he broke away to seek his fortune in Italian opera, and proceeded to gain first-hand experience of the latest Italian styles in Rome, Florence, Venice and Naples. A series of career moves brought him via Hanover to London, where he eventually settled and dominated the city's musical life for half a century. There he quickly made his mark in English church music as well as Italian opera, and eventually created two new musical genres--English theatre oratorio and the organ concerto.
Handel is important also because, as a musician, he also became a significant public figure. In Rome he attracted the patronage of princes and cardinals; soon after his arrival in London he appeared at the court of Queen Anne, and he subsequently enjoyed substantial support from the "Hanoverian" royal family. He survived turbulent periods in the musical and political life of London, reached a wider public through publications of his music, died a rich man and was buried in Westminster Abbey.
This biography provides a comprehensive and balanced account of both the man and his music, drawing on the unusually rich legacy of documentary and musical sources from Handel's lifetime. This new edition of a book that has been recognized as a 'classic' biography of Handel, reliable on the factual details of the composer's life and comprehensive in the coverage of his music, incorporates a great deal of new material. The last half century has seen a great renewal of research on the circumstances of Handel's life, and a major expansion in performances and recordings of his music. The book brings together the results of this scholarly activity, and is informed by wide experience of modern performances of Handel's music, including the revival of his operas and experimentation with 'authentic' performance practices.
Synopsis
Celebrating its 100th anniversary, this extraordinary series continues to amaze and captivate its readers with detailed insight into the lives and work of music's geniuses. Unlike other composer biographies that focus narrowly on the music, this series explores the personal history of each composer and the social context surrounding the music. In a precise, engaging, and authoritative manner, each volume combines a vivid portrait of the master musicians' inspirations, influences, life experiences, even their weaknesses, with an accessible discussion of their work-all in roughly 300 pages. Further, each volume offers superb reference material, including a detailed life and times chronology, a complete list of works, a personalia glossary highlighting the important people in the composer's life, and a select bibliography. Under the supervision of music expert and series general editor Stanley Sadie, Master Musicians will certainly proceed to delight music scholars, serious musicians, and all music lovers for another hundred years.
In this volume, Donald Burrows's relates Handel's life and his music, devoting particular attention to two crucial junctures in Handel's development: his transition from a church-trained musician in Germany to a successful opera composer in London, and the gradual transformation of his theater career from opera to oratorio, some thirty years later. In the oratorio form, as Burrows demonstrates, Handel was able to combine the techniques of large-scale construction and of aria writing that he had developed in his operas with an experience of choral music that went back to his earliest training as a church organist. The result was music that succeeds to this day in capturing the imagination of a vast audience.
Editorials
From the Publisher
"Can also serve as a reference tool for Handel and his works...Libraries with the earlier edition of this book would do well to replace it with this current edition." --Choice
"Burrows makes a valuable contribution towards restoring the balance...Burrows skillfully interweaves Handel's 'outward' biography with the 'inner' one of his creative life, linking the two aspects chronologically in irregularly alternating chapters. In this way the reader can conveniently use the book either as biography or as a commentary on the music...this is a considerable achievement. Burrows's study of Handel...provides us with a deeply informative and well-balanced composition."--BBC Music
"A welcome addition to what has already proved itself to be an excellent, authoritative series of musical biographies"--Classical Music
"This book, of Handelian solidity, is worth of its subject,...The Clarendon Press, as usual, have responded to a worthy book worthily; production, print, and musical calligraphy are exemplary, and the scholarly apparatus and appendices aare exhaustive but not exhausting."--The Oldie
"A properly balanced book, with due weight given to previously-neglected areas. It is particularly good to see Handel's English church music being given more attention. There is an immense amount of scholarship here, presented throughout the book in an accessible way ... an elegantly-produced hardback, it is outstandingly good value."--Peter Holman, The Musical Times
UNEDITED UK REVIEW: "Although precious few certain facts are known about Handel's pre-London career, this latest biography details them all in over 40 pages of well-reasoned narrative."--Classical Music
"...the best single-volume book on Handel...£25.00 is very good value for a work of this size, let alone excellence: it augers well for the new management."--Early Music review
"Not just a 'better' book, it is the best single-volume book on Handel ... The author has all the facts at his finger-tips, quotes extensively from the sources ... and makes sensible remarks on the music. There is a vast knowledge lying behind the book."--Clifford Bartlett, Early Music Review
UNEDITED UK REVIEW: "just about the perfect man for writing a biography of this kind, steeped primarily in the music and concerned with the creative inspiration of the composer, taking into account the revelations of modern scholarship. There is a wide-ranging, detailed analysis of Handel's operatic style ... Donald Burrows' Handel is a welcome addition to what has already proved itself to be an excellent, authoritative series of musical biographies."--Judith Eagle, Classical Music, March 1995
UNEDITED UK REVIEW: "Mr. Burrows writes like a specialist ... exudes authority not only in what he puts forward but also in his prudent refusal to claim too much. Mr. Burrows is, in fact, so wise and wry on the subject of Handel's borrowings that one might hope for a full-length study of the subject from him. Mr. Burrows's book will undoubtedly prove invaluable to serious students and useful as well to general readers."--James R. Oestreich, The New York Times, May 1995
UNEDITED UK REVIEW: "scholastically invaluable...Burrows musters together what there is to be known and presents a scholarly and elegantly written account of Handel's precociously cosmopolitan life."--Scene
UNEDITED UK REVIEW: "A major collection of documents giving fresh details of Handel's prsonality and methods, and of 18th-century English musical life, has come to light in Hampshire. A critical edition is planned for publication by OUP."--BBC Music
UNEDITED UK REVIEW: "Burrows firnishes ample incentive to sample Handel's vocal and instrumental riches more widely. Burrows incorporates a wealth of information undoubtedly known to Handelians but not to a wider readership ... Donald Burrows demonstrates industry worthy of his subject ... For the foreseeable future, Handel promises to remain the standard single-volume reference to this adopted son who became an English institution."--Malcolm S. Cole, Opera Quarterly, Vol. 13, No. 2, Winter 1996/7
"Mr. Burrows writes like a specialist ...exudes authority not only in what he puts forward but also in his prudent refusal to claim too much...[this book] will undoubtedly prove invaluable to serious students and useful as well to general readers."--The New York Times