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The Advice to Mr. Handel (1739) and Israel in Egypt’S Early Reception

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The Advice to Mr. Handel (1739) and Israel in Egypt’S Early Reception ilias chrissochoidis ‘true Merit always Envy rais’d’: the Advice to Mr. Handel (1739) and Israel in Egypt’s early reception This is a revised chapter he first runof Israel in Egypt, in April 1739, was a perilous moment of my dissertation ‘Early in Handel’s career. In just three performances, the oratorio enacted reception of Handel’s oratorios, 1732–1784: narrative Tthe story of Exodus, swerving from certain drowning to unexpected – studies – documents’ rescue. At the 4 April premiere of the work, reports a witness, Handel ‘did (Stanford University, 2004). 1 Additional research was not have twenty people in the pit’. The second performance (11 April) conducted on a John M. of a hastily revised Israel did not fare better, ‘for though it was a polite & Ward Fellowship in Dance and Music for the Theatre attentive audience, it was not large enough [...] to encourage [Handel] in at Harvard’s Houghton any future attempt’. Supporters of the composer mobilised and an open Library, whose generous letter in the press urged him to ‘perform [Israel] again in some time next and learned staff I wish to 2 thank. David Hunter’s strong week’. Sufficiently motivated, Handel scheduled a third performance for position on Lady Brown, and 17 April. That very day newspapers reported the scheduled appearance at its partisan defence in some 3 quarters, did have an impact the event of the Prince of Wales, whose latest reconciliation with the King on my approach to this topic. and newborn son had attracted wide attention. With such a publicity boost, However, my disagreement Israel finally reached the shore of success. As the London correspondent to with Professor Hunter stands on a foundation of collegial The Scots Magazine wrote, ‘the oratorio was performed, to the surprize of gratitude for his courage and myself and many more, to a very numerous audience’.4 efforts to probe long-held views on Handel. If princely clout helps explain the success of the 17 April performance, what made Israel to ‘f[a]ll resoundingly flat’ two weeks earlier?5 Structure and subject matter is the consensus among scholars. Unlike any previous James Harris, 1732–1780 accounts show that he Handell himself has been (Oxford & New York, 2002), attended the oratorio’s accused of conforming to 1. Giambattista Gastaldi to p.69; printed in The London premiere (Carole Taylor: this prevailing folly, in an Prince Cantemir, 9 April Daily Post, and General ‘Handel and Frederick, instance where (I cannot 1739: Lowell Lindgren: Advertiser no.1391, Friday 13 Prince of Wales’, in The help speaking with some ‘Musicians and librettists in April 1739, p.[2] [henceforth Musical Times vol.125 concern) there was the least the correspondence of Gio. LDP]; reprinted in Otto (1984), p.92); the note ‘the cause for descending to such Giacomo Zamboni (Oxford, Erich Deutsch: Handel: Prince Alone’ may suggest, mean arts’ (ibid.). As the Bodleian Library, MSS a documentary biography however, a non-publicised entire passage indicates, the Rawlinson letters 116–138)’, (London, 1955), p.480. visit. author reacts to the publicity in [RMA] Research Chronicle campaign of Handelians 24 (1991), p.173. 3. ‘the Prince and Princess 4. The Scots Magazine 1 in the press. He is clearly [of Wales] will be at the (1739), p.181; reported here unaware of the Advice and 2. ‘Philarmonica’ to James King’s Theatre in the Hay- for the first time. This is the efforts to derail Handel’s Harris, 12 April 1739: Market [...] to see Israel the only source to describe season. Donald Burrows & in Egypt’: LDP no.1394, public support to Handel in Rosemary Dunhill, edd.: Tuesday 17 April 1739, p.[1]; 1739 as a hype: ‘The art of 5. Winton Dean: Handel’s Music and theatre in Handel’s Deutsch: Handel, p.480. puffing increases beyond dramatic oratorios and masques world: the family papers of Remarkably, his household belief: and even the great (London, 1959), p.313. the musical times Spring 2009 69 70 ‘true Merit always Envy rais’d’: the Advice to Mr. Handel and Israel in Egypt’s early reception oratorio, Israel comprises ‘a vast span of largely undifferentiated choral 6. Donald Burrows: Handel music[, which] was beyond the scope of London’s relatively impatient (New York, 1994), p.247. theatre audience.’6 In other words, one did not need to pay half a guinea to The first part of the oratorio alone comprises a symphony hear anthems at an opera house. Israel’s textual content further compounded and 12 choruses in direct the problem. This was the first Handelian oratorio to use a substantial succession. amount of biblical text.7 The onstage performance of a scriptural anthology 7. For the libretto and the naturally raised objections (‘stupid, senseless Exceptions’, according to question of authorship, 8 see Ruth Smith: Handel’s a Handelian in 1740) in ecclesiastical circles. In 1743, Messiah’s librettist oratorios and eighteenth- Charles Jennens would be reminded of a certain cleric who in the past century thought (Cambridge, 9 1995), p.291; and Georg ‘took offence at Exodus [i.e., Israel in Egypt]’. It is also possible that, in Friedrich Händel, ed. the charged political climate of early 1739, the story of a persecuted people Annette Landgraf: Israel in 10 Egypt, 2 vols. (Kassel, 1999), could have invited anti-governmental readings. vol.1, pp.xxix–xxx. The above explanations consider the oratorio’s music and text (and, by 8. The passage ‘the stupid, necessity, allude to Handel’s poor decision-making), but they leave critical senseless Exceptions that questions unanswered. For instance, how did opera goers know of Israel’s have been taken to [...] this, in particular, and the other problematic features ahead of the premiere? Advertisements hardly go Oratorios [...] from the beyond the title of the work and no open rehearsal was announced in the Place they are exhibited in’ appears only in the revised press. On the contrary, we do know that as early as Autumn 1738 Handel version of the letter dated himself began touting those features of Israel that could easily fill his 18 April [1739], in LDP theatre: ‘he says the storm of thunder is to be bold and fine, & the thick no.1696, Tuesday 1 April 11 1740, pp.[1–2]. Deutsch silent darkness is to be express’d in a very particular piece of musick.’ erroneously identifies and Word of mouth alone could have led many to the King’s Theatre on 4 April. dates the original paper as the London Daily Post of How can we explain the opposite outcome at Israel’s premiere? 18 April (Handel, p.482); it was published in The Daily Advertiser of the following The poem day (see my essay ‘Handel at the crossroads: new A possibility that has escaped serious attention, if only for a lack of sources, is contributions on his 1738 and 1739 seasons’, forthcoming in that Israel suffered a boycott by anti-Handelian circles. This scenario emerges Music & Letters). from a unique document, the Advice to Mr. Handel (fig.1).12 Surviving in a 9. Edward Holdsworth to single copy at Harvard’s Houghton Library, it offers a poetical defence of Charles Jennens, 21 February 13 1743: Smith: Oratorios, p.422, Israel in Egypt. Its anonymous author claims that Handel became the target n.16. of a theatrical ambush organised by a character named ‘the Fiend’, whose 10. See The London Evening- predator tactics he decries, while comforting the artist. Post no.1777, Tuesday 3–Thursday 5 April 1739, 12. David Hunter: ‘Advice to p.[1]; Deutsch: Handel, editions, 2 vols. (Cambridge, microfilm collection Mr. Handel’, in Newsletter of p.479. 1975; 2nd printing, New ‘The eighteenth century’ the American Handel Society Castle, Delaware & London, (Woodbridge, CT, 11. Katherine Knatchbull to 12:3 (December 1997), pp.3, 2003), vol.1, p.9 (item 1985), reel 1013, no.5; James Harris [5 December 6; as Hunter acknowledges, A82), and in the English and in the ‘Eighteenth 1738]: Burrows & Dunhill, the poem is listed in two short-title catalogue century collections edd.: Handel’s world, p.66. bibliographical sources: (ESTCN1604). online’, Gale Group For the innovative features DF Foxon: English verse (http://galenet.galegroup. of the work, see Burrows: 1701–1750: a catalogue of 13. US-CAh, *EB7. com/servlet/ECCO), Handel, pp.246–49; and separately printed poems with A100.739a; the document Gale Document Number Händel: Israel, pp.xxvi–xxvii. notes on contemporary collected is also available in the CW3324696057. Fig.1: Advice to Mr. Handel (by permission of Houghton Library, Harvard University) Published by David Hunter in 1997, the poem has received little scrutiny so far. Its date of 1739 remains tentative (or at least a borderline); and there is no real discussion of its authorship. Still more, the identification of the ‘Fiend’ as Lady Margaret Brown is based on her notorious fame during the mid-1740s, half-a-decade after Israel’s premiere. Given the absence of a detailed context, it is premature to claim as ‘less likely that Israel [sic] itself was the particular occasion for the poem, but that its production offered the author of the broadsheet an opportunity to decry the actions of “The 14. Hunter: ‘Advice’, p.6. Fiend”.’14 Even less secure is to use the Advice as ‘evidence’ of prejudice the musical times Spring 2009 71 72 ‘true Merit always Envy rais’d’: the Advice to Mr. Handel and Israel in Egypt’s early reception against Lady Brown (thus reversing the poem’s claim).15 In this essay, I present an historical frame for the Advice, and probe motives and actions surrounding its genesis.
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