And now it was time for trumpeting and Hallelujahs. Handel not only obliged but composed two rousing anthems that could grace any of the oratorios except this one, for here they are anticlimactic and superfluous. The quintet, which was added in 1753, is really a duet with the other voices later joining in a ripieno fashion. This is an excellent piece that should and could be salvaged. As suggested above, by omitting the final numbers and ending the work with the fine chorus “Theme sublime of endless praise,” Jephtha would gain a coherence that too much insistence on a happy ending denies it.
[4]
HANDEL BEGAN Jephtha January 21, 1751. On February 13, well advanced in the score, he had to stop. “Got so far as this,” he writes in the middle of the great chorus in the second act, “unable to continue because of weakening of the sight of my left eye.” 116 Ten days later the composer felt “a little better” and resumed work, but the relief was short-lived; on the 27th he had to break off again. In the face of this calamity he remained steady and disciplined. The oratorio season took place as usual, and he even played the organ. The deposits in the Bank of England show that Belshazzar, Alexander’s Feast, Esther, and Judas Maccabaeus were as popular as ever. The season came to an abrupt end with the death of the Prince of Wales on March 20, and all entertainments were cancelled. His vision now was gravely impaired, and Handel tried to rest. After a short “cure” at Cheltenham he returned to London, receiving treatment from an eye surgeon, and on June 18 resumed work on Jephtha, but he was no longer equal to his usual phenomenal tempo; fall was approaching before the score was finished. The autograph itself shows the struggle; it is full of corrections and second thoughts. The Lenten season of 1752 started on February 14, with Joshua followed by Hercules; then on February 26 Jephtha, had its première, the cast consisting of Beard (Jephtha), Galli (Storgè), Frasi (Iphis), Brent (Hamor), and Wass (Zebul). Brent, a counter tenor, was a new Handelian singer of transitory importance, but Wass, the bass, became a frequent replacement for Reinhold. Chrysander was aware of the significance of Jephtha and took unusual care with the editing of the score, even issuing a facsimile of the autograph. Unfortunately, at that stage the technique of such reproductions was still unequal to the nuances; the many important alterations that Handel made in pencil do not show. Yet while much of Chrysander’s work is admirable, and his detailed comments are valuable, his arbitrary ways did not desert him. He failed to heed Handel’s corrections in Morell’s text even though these corrections touch upon the essence of the composer’s frame of mind.
We do not know how Jephtha was received. Mary Delany thought it “a very fine [oratorio], but very different from any of his others.” Whether her perceptive observation was shared by the public, or whether they found the happy ending sufficient to cancel the searching, sharp, and stirring power of the rest, we are unable to ascertain. The oratorio was revived the next year, and again in 1756 and 1758; a total of seven performances indicates it won at least a modicum of acceptance.
XXI
1752-1759
Handel undergoes unsuccessful eye surgery—No failure of creative imagination—Additions to revised oratorios dictated—First codicil to will August 1756—The Triumph of Time and Truth (1756), last “new” work —Morell’s libretto—The music—Second and third codicils—Handel supposedly operated on by Taylor summer of 1758—Last oratorio season ends, April 6, 1759—Final codicil—Handel dies on April 14, 1759, and is buried in Westminster Abbey
ON AUGUST 17, 1752, THE General Advertiser REPORTED that “George-Frederick Handel, Esq; the celebrated Composer of Musick was seized a few Days ago with a Paralytick Disorder in his Head, which has deprived him of Sight.” On November 3117 he was “couch’d by William Bromfield, Esq,” the Princess of Wales’s surgeon. There was a certain improvement in January 1753, but only for a few days; by the end of that month Handel had a relapse and almost total blindness ensued. The newspaper notices were manifestly incorrect in their diagnosis of paralysis; the stroke Handel suffered when he was compelled to go to Aix-la-Chapelle was probably recalled. This time he was in full command of his mind, and though suffering from other physical ailments brought about by age and obesity, his eyes were the victim of no cerebral disorder but of cataracts, which inept surgery worsened.
“Aetatis 66,” Handel wrote on the last page of Jephtha. The annotation, unusual for him, brings back Penseroso’s lines:
May at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage.
This was the end, the last original work, and all the other concerns of life seem to retire into the background. The outside world disappeared not only from his sight; he no longer went anywhere except to his concerts and to the services at St. George’s Church. Posterity has in general accepted as fact that, with the extinction of his sight, Handel’s spirit collapsed under the strain, that the crippled composer’s remaining years bore only fruits of frost. “That fortitude which had supported him under afliic-tions of another kind now deserted him,” says Hawkins, while others speak of “broken spirit” and “great despondency.” It seems to us that such a view is unreliable in fact and controvertible in interpretation. Blind and ill, Handel was still Handel; idleness and mere drift were impossible for him, work was his anodyne, and he filled his sightless days with incessant labor. No, the flame was not extinct. A man who has lived in continuous creative activity, who has lived strongly and resolutely through much adversity, could not, by being dealt one more blow, become a disburdened Atlas. There is no question that at times one is aware of a creative fatigue, but Schering already warned that such manifestations in certain numbers of Jephtha are misleading, that there is no sign of the failure of powerful imagination. As we take a closer look at Handel’s remaining years we shall see at every point a more virile and positive figure than the helpless recluse who has hitherto represented the blind musician in the general imagination. He retired into his sightless world without rancor, without a feeling of defeat. With his mistress, Solitude, who understood him and accorded with his feelings, he was in uninterrupted and happy contact with a host of familiar spirits. He will still have some beautiful days, for even in November there are such days, recalling a more vivid season; and he will find a strong supporter—Wisdom. Handel’s spirit was alive until the end; then, in his last days, he turned from life ready to face whatever new enterprise death might turn out to be.
To make some kind of adjustment to his blindness was Handel’s first challenge, and he met it. Though without the lifelong habit of making music in darkness that made John Stanley an accomplished performer not in the least restricted or inhibited, he still managed to continue playing and directing.118 He still conducted some performances in the year of his death, and up to 1758 rehearsals were held in his home the day before the performance. Only eight days before his death he attended a performance of Messiah. Though unable to read, he had not lost his former interests. We see him subscribing at the end of 1753 to the works of the late Aaron Hill, a four-volume collection of the writings of his old friend and sometime librettist. The many alterations and additions to the oratorios revived during these seven years reveal a firm grip, a comprehension both of form and substance. How fully the physically invalid composer was in possession of his mental powers, though dictating his music as the blind Milton did his poetry, is perhaps most eloquently illustrated by the alterations in “Wise men flatt’ring may deceive you,” done for the revival of Judas Maccabaeus in 1758; its freshness and delicate orchestration rival the best of his work in that genre. The year before he had added to Esther a magnificent duet and chorus, “Sion now her head shall raise.” In both cases he had to rely also on his phenomenal memory, which apparently remained intact, because in both instances he developed borrowed material in his inimitably inventive manner. Finally, 1757 saw another major, full-evening “new” work, The Triumph of Time and Truth.
[2]
THE ORATORIO SEASON OF 1753 began on March 9 with Alexander’s Feast and The Choice of Hercules. N
o concerto was announced, though the performances themselves may have been conducted by Handel. Jephtha, Judas Maccabaeus, Samson, and Messiah followed, all of them except Messiah repeated. (The annual charity performances of the latter oratorio obviated the need for repeating it in public performances.) The following year’s Lenten season saw revivals of Alexander Balus, Deborah, Saul, Joshua, Judas Maccabaeus, and Samson, the season again concluding with Messiah. On May 15, 1754, Handel conducted Messiah for the last time in the Foundling Hospital; soon afterwards John Christopher Smith, the younger, was appointed organist and conductor for these benefits, but Handel always attended them. The 1755 and 1756 seasons also presented the old favorites, though Handel insisted on one performance of Theodora in 1755. As we scan this list we observe how the public held fast to its original judgment. Israel in Egypt still puzzled them, or as Mrs. Delany remarked in 1756, it “did not take, it is too solemn for common ears.” And of course Theodora, as we have seen, was simply not accepted. But Handel’s account at the Bank of England grew steadily.
By this time the aged composer had become nationally famous, his works were performed everywhere in the provinces, and his name was the chief attraction on the programs of the many charity events. The times had changed indeed. From 1753 onward at the King’s Theatre in the Haymarket, which used to be the headquarters of his enemies when not tenanted by Handel, his works were performed under Stanley’s direction. Deutsch tells us that there were instances when Handel’s name appeared simultaneously in the advertisements of three of London’s theatres. Oxford too had changed since the days of the irascible Dr. Hearne. Now the university had a professor of music, William Hayes, an ardent Handelian, under whom a number of performances took place yearly “attended with very crouded Audiences.” These performances were considered to “equal in Grandeur and Elegance any of the kind that have been exhibited in this Kingdom.” Some of Handel’s experienced singers were in great demand for such occasions, travelling over the country. Among the conductors, besides the indefatigable Dr. Hayes, Stanley, and Christopher Smith, we find such notable composers as Dr. Boyce. There is even on record a performance of two of Handel’s songs at a concert in New York in 1756. Handel’s fame was such that as early as 1753 Walsh offered twenty-two of his oratorios in a sort of Gesamtausgabe, bound in twelve volumes.
On August 6, 1756, Handel executed the first codicil to his will, taking care of the shares made vacant by the death of several persons, increasing the benefits to others, and assigning new bequests to Morell and Newburgh Hamilton. John Christopher Smith, the elder, Handel’s copyist, amanuensis, and friend since the Halle school days, with whom he for some unknown reason fell out for a while, was reinstated and his legacy generously increased. No provisions were made for the younger Smith, a pupil and loyal aide to the old composer. Handel presumably expected the younger man to inherit his father’s effects, as indeed he did.119 The few ties Handel still had to Germany were not overlooked. In September 1754 he wrote, or rather dictated, a letter (still in French) to Telemann. The friendly note inquired about the other old composer’s health and announced the consignment of a shipment of “exotic plants” to his colleague, who was a devoted horticulturalist.
Esther opened the 1757 season on February 25; on March 11 The Triumph of Time and Truth, “altered from the Italian, with several new Additions,” introduced the first new full-evening entertainment offered by Handel since Jephtha. The new “oratorio” was the third version of Il Trionfo del Tempo e della Verità of about 1708, the second being the 1737 Covent Garden production of Il Trionfo o del Tempo e del Disinganno. Morell now made an English version, adding a new figure, Deceit. Since the mandatory gestures of the biblical oratorio were absent, Morell felt free to indulge in what for him was high poetry. Handel, too, felt free to put together on a sufficiently simple plan a series of happy ideas separately elaborated, picking up the thoughts as he found them in his capacious memory. The Triumph of Time and Truth is an allegory that does not lead anywhere in particular. It may at times be loosely knit and wandering, but it never loses its charm and poetry. Without mystery, it is full of clear and definite detail, such as could be shaped only by a brain altogether unencumbered by “great despondency.” The unchanging rhythm of quietude and contentment that informs it evokes an atmosphere of peace and kindliness. Fifty years of music passes before Handel’s mind’s eye. He reminisces, putting into the score all the things that were close to his heart, the bucolic nature pieces, the great choruses, arias, here melting, there meditative. The Triumph of Time and Truth for a moment brought together the two worlds of Handel, the years brimming with activity and the ones restricted to memories. The revisions, new accompaniments, new orchestration, and the few new pieces are all done with thoughtful care, the music, except where Handel deliberately departs from Morell, always ably adapted to the new words. This is perhaps not a work for the repertory, too many of its numbers being well known in other contexts, but it should be heard, for it is an admirable summary of Handel’s entire musical career. Going back all the way to the serenata composed in Rome, following with excerpts from the Chandos Anthems, some of the operas, and up to the Foundling Hospital Anthem, he touched upon every phase. Yet The Triumph of Time and Truth is not a potpourri, the pasticcio of old; Handel was holding a review. If he could no longer see his beloved pictures hanging on the walls, he could still hear the ones he himself created in sound. Memories have a way of being vagrant, but also fragrant, and to describe this work as esthetic pantheism is to use a cold formula. The public liked these memories; there were three repeat performances and a revival during the next season.
A second codicil was added to the will on March 22. His faithful attendant, Peter le Blond, having died, Handel now remembers the servant’s nephew. In general, we see that whenever a beneficiary is removed by death, rather than cancel the bequest Handel would extend it to the next of kin. A third codicil was drawn up on August 4. It contained the following new items: John Rich was given the “Great Organ that stands at the Theatre Royal in Covent Garden”; Jennens received two pictures by Denner; and Bernard Granville, Mary Delany’s brother, two Rembrandts; while the Foundling Hospital became the possessor of “a fair copy of the Score and all Parts” of Messiah.120
After the close of the 1758 season, in the summer, Handel went to Tunbridge Wells, allegedly to be treated by John Taylor, Sr., an eye specialist also known as “the Chevalier.” This “ophtalmieter” was a quack, though eventually boasting the title of court oculist to George III. If the operation really took place (Taylor’s memoirs are filled with unreliable and inaccurate stories), this suave adventurer can claim to have contributed substantially to the misery of the two greatest musicians of the age. It was Taylor who in 1750 operated on the blind Bach—equally unsuccessfully.
During his last season the seventy-four-year-old and seriously ailing Handel still oversaw the performances, even playing and conducting intermittently. When John Christopher Smith conducted, the blind man was led into the theatre, and occasionally to the organ or harpsichord. This last season was as strenuous as many in his heyday: Solomon, Samson, Judas Maccabaeus, as well as again one of the orphans, Susanna, were given in several performances, all of them with “additions and alterations.” But Handel knew that the end was near, and he was ready for it. The season closed on April 6, 1759, and on the 11th Handel dictated the fourth and final codicil to his will. His old friend Dubourg was remembered, also Thomas Harris, and a gift of a thousand pounds was earmarked for the Society for the Support of Decayed Musicians.
In addition to the personal items there was a curious paragraph in this last codicil.
I hope to have the permission of the Dean and Chapter of Westminster to be buried in Westminster Abbey in a private manner at the discretion of my Executor, Mr. Amyand and I desire that my said Executor may have leave to erect a monument for me there and that any sum not Exceeding Six Hundred Pounds be expended for that purpose at the discretion of my said Executor.
It was altogether unheard of for anyone to suggest that he be buried in the national pantheon; the suggestion usually came from a “grateful nation.” At first glance, Handel’s wish appears either naive or preposterous, but if we follow his career in England we shall realize that it was neither; it was entirely in keeping with his character. It is impossible not to see in this act of Handel’s a profession of faith that is also a clear refutation of the national claims advanced by a number of German scholars. The qualities of heart and mind that enabled Handel to identify himself with England, and the courage and force with which he triumphed over all obstacles to end his life as an English institution, devotedly acclaimed by his compatriots, naturally called for some sort of acknowledgment. We are convinced as we read about the infirm old man’s continued activities, running his oratorio seasons, dictating the changes and new numbers to Christopher Smith, that if he had to go through all the struggles and defeats of his career again he would do so, because this was his world. He never capitulated and after each resurgence his forum became larger until it encompassed the nation. His character did not deteriorate, he never became pretentious or snobbish; he accepted himself and his genius with simplicity and with immense gusto and enjoyed fame and power to the full, but he also took every opportunity to be kind. He belonged in England, and since by the end of his life he was considered a great Briton, not only de jure, by virtue of his naturalization almost forty years before, but by acclamation, which no legal document, only a people’s heart, can offer, he simply wanted to be laid to rest where such persons in England are laid to rest. His was not a preposterous demand but a request that seemed perfectly natural to him. His wrestling with reality now gave way to quiet certitude; he stated his wish in plain terms, including the request for private interment. This wish, unusual as it was, was neither questioned nor even considered out of the ordinary; his place among the nation’s great seemed as natural to his fellow subjects as it did to him. When he died the newspapers were unanimous in extolling the greatness of “the most excellent Musician Any Age ever produced.” Earlier in this book we called Handel’s purposeful wanderings a great quest, and it was a quest in which he had very early decided that the will must play a large part. It was one of his abiding characteristics to dismiss the past; his mind was always on the present and the future. He forgot himself in the cause and was able to identify the cause with himself. Westminster Abbey was the logical end of the quest, the one thing conceivable among all that was inconceivable.
George Frideric Handel_Dover Books on Music Page 72