George Frederic Handel, whom we will venture to call the greatest of musicians, considering the state in which he found his art, and the means at his command, was born at Halle, in the Duchy of Magdeburg, February 24, 1684. He was intended, almost from his cradle, for the profession of the civil law; but, at the early age of seven, he manifested so uncontrollable an inclination, and so decided a talent for the study of music, that his father, an eminent physician, wisely consented to change his destination, and suffered him to continue under the direction of a master those studies, which he had been secretly pursuing with no other guide than his own genius.

Friedrich Zachau, organist of the cathedral church of Halle, was the first and indeed the chief instructor of Handel. He discharged the duties of his office so well, that his pupil, when not nine years old, had become competent to officiate for his teacher, and had composed, it is said, many motets for the service of the church. A set of sonatas, written by him when only ten years old, was in the possession of George III., and probably forms part of the musical library of our present sovereign.

In 1703 Handel went to Hamburg, where the opera was then flourishing under the direction of Reinhard Keiser, a master of deserved celebrity, but whose gaiety and expensive habits often compelled him to absent himself from the theatre. On one of these occasions Handel was appointed to fill his place as conductor. This preference of a junior roused the jealousy of a fellow-performer, named Mattheson, to such a degree that a rencontre took place between the rivals in the street: and Handel was saved from a sword-thrust, which probably would have taken fatal effect, only by the interposition of a music-score, which he carried buttoned up under his coat. Till this time he had occupied but a very subordinate situation in the orchestra, that of second ripieno violin; for from the period of his father’s death he had depended wholly on his own exertions, nobly determining not to diminish his mother’s rather straitened income by any demands on her for pecuniary assistance. But now an opportunity for making known his powers was arrived; for the continued absence of the conductor Keiser from his post induced the manager to employ Handel in setting to music a drama called Almeria. So great was the success of this piece, that it was performed thirty nights without interruption. The year following he composed Florinda; and soon after, Nerone, both of which were received in as favourable a manner as his first dramatic effort; but not one of these is to be found in the collection formed by George III., and they seem quite unknown to all writers on music, except by their titles.

The success of his operas at Hamburg produced a sum which enabled him to visit Italy. Florence was the first city in which he made any stay. He was there received in the kindest manner by the Grand Duke Giovanni Gaston de Medicis, and produced the opera of Rodrigo in 1709, for which he was presented with a hundred sequins, and a service of plate. Thence he proceeded to Venice, where he brought out Agrippina, which was received with acclamation, and performed twenty-seven nights successively. It seems that horns and other wind-instruments were in this opera first used in Italy as accompaniments to the voice. Here the charms of his music made an impression on the famous beauty and singer, Signora Vittoria, a lady particularly distinguished by the Grand Duke; but in this, as in every instance of a similar kind, Handel showed no disposition to avail himself of any partialities exhibited in his favour. His thoughts were nearly all absorbed by his art, and it is but just to conclude that he was also influenced by those sentiments of moral propriety which so distinctly marked his conduct through life. It is to be admitted, however, that he was too much inclined to indulge in the pleasures of the table.

On visiting Rome he was hospitably and kindly entertained by the Cardinal Ottoboni, a person of the most refined taste and princely magnificence. Besides his splendid collection of pictures and statues, he possessed a library of music of great extent, and kept in his service an excellent band of performers, which was under the direction of the celebrated Corelli. At one of the parties made by the Cardinal, Handel produced the overture to Il Trionfo del Tempo, which was attempted by the band so unsuccessfully, that the composer, in his hasty manner, snatched the violin from Corelli, and played the most difficult passages with his own hand. The Italian, who was all modesty and meekness, ingenuously confessed that he did not understand the kind of music; and, when Handel still appeared impatient, only said, “Ma, caro Sassone, questa musica È nel stilo Francese, di ch’io non m’intendo”—(“But, my dear Saxon, this music is in the French style, which I do not understand”). And so far Corelli was perfectly right; Handel’s overtures are formed after the model of Lully, though, it is hardly necessary to add, he improved what he imitated. This anecdote indicates the vast superiority in point of execution possessed by the moderns. A learner of two years’ standing would now play the violin part of any of Handel’s overtures at first sight, without a fault.

At Rome Handel composed his Trionfo del Tempo, the words of which were written for him by the Cardinal Pamphilii, and a kind of mystery, or oratorio, La Resurrezione. The former he afterwards brought out in London, with English words by Dr. Morell, under the title of the Triumph of Time and Truth. From Rome he went to Naples, where he was treated with every mark of distinction. But he now resolved, notwithstanding the many attempts made to keep him in Italy, to return to Germany; and in 1710 reached Hanover, where he found a generous patron in the Elector, who subsequently ascended the English throne as George I. Here he met the learned composer, Steffani, who, having arrived at a time of life when retirement becomes desirable, resigned his office of Maestro di Capella to the Elector, and Handel was appointed his successor, with a salary of 1500 crowns, upon condition that he would return to the court of Hanover at the termination of his travels.

Towards the end of 1710 Handel arrived in London. He was soon introduced at court, and honoured with marks of Queen Anne’s favour. Aaron Hill was then manager of the Italian opera, and immediately sketched a drama from Tasso’s Jerusalem, which Rossi worked into an opera under the name of Rinaldo, and Handel set to music. This was brought out in March, 1711; and it is stated in the preface that it was composed in a fortnight, a strong recommendation of a work to those who delight in the wonderful rather than in the excellent: but in fact there is nothing in this which could have put the composer to much expense either of time or thought. Handel undoubtedly wrote better operas than any of his contemporaries or predecessors; but he was controlled by the habits and taste of the day, and knew by experience that two or three good pieces were as much as the fashionable frequenters of the Italian theatre would listen to, in his time.

At the close of 1711 he returned to Hanover, but revisited London late in 1712; and shortly after was selected, not without many murmurs from English musicians, to compose a Te Deum and Jubilate on occasion of the peace of Utrecht. The Queen settled on him a pension of two hundred pounds as the reward of his labour,—and as he was solicited to write again for the Italian stage, he never thought of returning to his engagement at Hanover, till the accession of the Elector to the British throne reminded him of his neglect of his royal employer and patron. On the arrival of George I. in London, Handel wanted the courage to present himself at court; but his friend, Baron Kilmansegge, had the address to get him restored to royal favour. The pleasing Water-Music, performed during an excursion made up the river by the King, was the means by which the German baron brought about the reconciliation; and this was accompanied by an addition of two hundred pounds to the pension granted by Queen Anne.

From the year 1715 to 1720, Handel composed only three operas. The three first years of this period he passed at the Earl of Burlington’s, where he was constantly in the habit of meeting Pope, who, though devoid of any taste for music, always spoke and wrote in a flattering manner of the German composer. The other two years he devoted to the Duke of Chandos, Pope’s Timon; and at Cannons, the Duke’s seat, he produced many of his anthems, which must be classed among the finest of his works, together with the greater number of his hautbois concertos, sonatas, lessons, and organ fugues.

A project was now formed by several of the English nobility for erecting the Italian theatre into an Academy of Music, and Handel was chosen as manager, with a condition that he should supply a certain number of operas. In pursuance of this, he went to Dresden to engage singers, and brought back with him several of great celebrity, Senesino among the number. His first opera under the new system was Radamisto, the success of which was astonishing. But there were at that time two Italian composers in London, Bononcini and Attilio, who till then had been attached to the opera-house, and were not without powerful supporters. These persons did not passively notice the ascendancy of Handel, and the insignificance into which they were in danger of falling; they persuaded several weak and some factious people of noble rank to espouse their cause, and to oppose the German intruder, as they called the new manager. Hence arose those feuds to which Swift has given immortality by his well-known epigram; and hence may be traced Handel’s retirement from a scene of cabal, persecution, and loss. The final result of this, however, was fortunate, for it led to the production of his greatest works, his oratorios, which not only amply compensated him for all the injury which his fortune sustained in this contest, but raised him to a height of fame which he could never have gained by his Italian operas.

The two contending parties, wishing to appear reasonable, proposed something like terms of accommodation: these were, that an opera in three acts should be composed by the three rivals, one act by each, and that he who best succeeded should for ever after take the precedence. The drama chosen was Muzio Scevola, of which Bononcini set the first act, Handel the second, and Attilio the third. Handel’s “won the cause,” and Bononcini’s was pronounced the next in merit. But, strange to say, though each no doubt strained his ability to the utmost in this struggle, not a single piece in the whole opera is known in the present day, or is, perhaps, to be found, except in the libraries of curious collectors.

This victory left Handel master of the field for some years, and the academy prospered. During this period he brought out about fifteen of his best operas. But the genius of discord must always have a seat in the temple of harmony, and a dispute between the German manager and the Italian soprano, Senesino, renewed former quarrels, broke up the academy, materially damaged the fortune of the great composer, and was the cause of infinite vexation to him during much of his future life.

Dr. Arbuthnot, always a staunch friend of Handel, now became his champion, and his ridicule had more weight with the sensible portion of the public than the futile arguments, if they deserve the name, advanced by the noble supporters of Senesino. But fashion and prejudice were, as usual, too strong for reason: a rival opera-house was opened in Lincoln’s Inn Fields, and after having composed several new operas, comprising some of his best, and having sacrificed nearly the whole of his property and injured his health, in a spirited attempt to support the cause of the lyric stage against the presumption of singers, and the folly of their abettors, Handel was at last compelled to terminate his ineffectual labours, and stop his ruinous expenses, by abandoning the contest and the Italian opera together.

The sacred musical drama, or oratorio, was ultimately destined to repair his all but ruined fortune, and to establish his fame beyond the reach of cavil, and for ever. Esther, the words of which it is said were the joint production of Pope and Arbuthnot, was composed for the Duke of Chandos in 1720. In 1732 it was performed ten nights at the Haymarket, or King’s Theatre. Deborah was produced in 1733, and in the same year Athalia was brought out at Oxford. These three oratorios were performed at Covent Garden, in the Lent of 1734. Acis and Galatea, and Alexander’s Feast, were brought out in 1735; Israel in Egypt, in 1738; L’Allegro ed il Penseroso, in 1739. Saul was produced at the theatre in Lincoln’s Inn Fields in 1740. But up to this period his oratorios failed to reimburse him for the expenses incurred; and even the Messiah, that sublime and matchless work, was, as Dr. Burney, Sir John Hawkins, and Handel’s first biographer, Mr. Mainwaring, all agree in stating, not only ill attended, but ill received, when first given to the public, in the capital of the empire, in 1741.

Such miscarriages, and a severe fit of illness, the supposed consequence of them, determined him to try his oratorios in the sister kingdom, where he hoped to be out of the reach of prejudice, envy, and hostility. Dublin was at that time noted for the gaiety and splendour of its court, and the opulence and spirit of its principal inhabitants. Handel, therefore, judged wisely in appealing to such a people. Pope in his Dunciad alludes to this part of his history, introducing a poor phantom as representative of the Italian opera, who thus instructs Dullness:—

“On his arrival in Dublin,” we are told by Dr. Burney, in his Commemoration of Handel, “he, with equal judgment and humanity, began by performing the Messiah for the benefit of the city prison. This act of generosity and benevolence met with universal approbation, as well as his music, which was admirably performed.” He remained in Ireland about nine months, where his finances began to mend, an earnest, as it were, of the more favourable reception which he experienced on returning to London in 1742. He then recommenced his oratorios at Covent Garden; Sampson was the first performed. And now fortune seemed to wait on all his undertakings; and he took the tide at the flood. His last oratorio became most popular, and the Messiah was now received with universal admiration and applause. Dr. Burney remarks, “From that time to the present, this great work has been heard in all parts of the kingdom with increasing reverence and delight; it has fed the hungry, clothed the naked, fostered the orphan,” and, he might have added, healed the sick. Influenced by the most disinterested motives of humanity, Handel resolved to perform his Messiah annually for the benefit of the Foundling Hospital, and, under his own direction and that of his successors, it added to the funds of that charity alone the sum of £10,300. How much it has produced to other benevolent institutions, it is impossible to calculate; the amount must be enormous.

He continued his oratorios till almost the moment of his death, and derived considerable pecuniary advantage from them, though a considerable portion of the nobility persevered in their opposition to him. George II., however, was his steady patron, and constantly attended his performances, when they were abandoned by most of his court.

In the close of life, Handel had the misfortune to lose his sight, from an attack of gutta serena, in 1751. This evil for a time plunged him into deep despondency; but when the event was no longer doubtful, an earnest and sincere sense of religion enabled him to bear his affliction with fortitude, and he not only continued to perform, but even to compose. For this purpose, he employed as his amanuensis Mr. John Christian Smith, a good musician, who furnished materials for a life of his employer and friend, and succeeded him in the management of the oratorios. “To see him, however,” Dr. Burney feelingly observes, “led to the organ after this calamity, at upwards of seventy years of age, and then conducted towards the audience to make his accustomed obeisance, was a sight so truly afflicting to persons of sensibility, as greatly diminished their pleasure in hearing him perform.”

His last appearance in public was on the 6th of April, 1759. He died that day week, on Good-Friday, thus realizing a hope which he expressed a very few days before his decease, when aware that his last hours were approaching. He was buried in Westminster Abbey; the Dean, Dr. Pearce, Bishop of Rochester, assisted by all the officers of the choir, performed the ceremony. A fine monument, executed by Roubiliac, is placed in Poet’s Corner, above the spot where his mortal remains are deposited; but a still more honourable tribute to his memory was paid in the year 1784, by the performances which took place under the roof which covers his dust. A century having then elapsed from the time of his birth, it was proposed that a Commemoration of Handel should take place. The management of it was intrusted to the directors of the ancient concert, and eight of the most distinguished members of the musical profession. The King, George III., zealously patronised the undertaking, and nearly all the upper classes of the kingdom seconded the royal views. A vocal and instrumental band of 525 persons was collected from all parts, for the purpose of performing in a manner never before even imagined, the choicest works of the master. The great aisle in Westminster Abbey was fitted up for the occasion, with boxes for the Royal Family, the Directors, the Bench of Bishops, and the Dean and Prebendaries of the Church; galleries were erected on each side, and a grand orchestra was built over the great west door, extending from within a few feet of the ground, to nearly half-way up the great window. There were four morning performances in the church: the tickets of admission were one guinea each; and the gross receipts (including an evening concert at the Pantheon) amounted to £12,736. The disbursements rather exceeded £6,000, and the profits were given to the Society for Decayed Musicians and the Westminster Hospital; £6,000 to the former, and £1,000 to the latter. Such was the success of this great enterprise, that similar performances, increasing each year in magnitude, took place annually till the period of the French Revolution, when the state of public affairs did not encourage their longer continuance.

As a composer, Handel was great in all styles—from the familiar and airy to the grand and sublime. His instinctive taste for melody, and the high value he set on it, are obvious in all his works; but he felt no less strongly the charms of harmony, in fulness and richness of which he far surpassed even the greatest musicians who preceded him. And had he been able to employ the variety of instruments now in use, some of which have been invented since his death, and to command that orchestral talent, which probably has had some share in stimulating the inventive faculty of modern composers, it is reasonable to suppose that the field of his conceptions would have expanded with the means at his command. Unrivalled in sublimity, he might then have anticipated the variety and brilliance of later masters.

Generally speaking, Handel set his words with deep feeling and strong sense. Now and then he certainly betrayed a wish to imitate by sounds what sounds are incapable of imitating; and occasionally attempted to express the meaning of an isolated word, without due reference to the context. And sometimes, though not often, his want of a complete knowledge of our language led him into errors of accentuation. But these defects, though great in little men, dwindle almost to nothing in this “giant of the art:” and every competent judge, who contemplates the grandeur, beauty, science, variety, and number of Handel’s productions, will feel for him that admiration which Haydn, and still more Mozart, was proud to avow, and be ready to exclaim in the words of Beethoven, “Handel is the unequalled master of all masters! Go, turn to him, and learn, with such scanty means, how to produce such effects!”