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G.F. Händel

Occasional Oratorio

Oratorio in three Parts for Soli, Chor and Orchestra

»Dafür war die Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin das optimale Ensemble. Mit bewährter, historisch-informierter Spielweise kosteten sie edles Melos und feine Binnenexpressivität von Händels Idiom aus, allen voran ihre Holzbläser und die exquisite Basso continuo-Gruppe.«

Süddeutsche Zeitung

»Howard Arman führt die Musiker an der langen Leine und holt damit alles aus dem Ensemble heraus.«

Müchner Merkur

London, 1746: In a time of personal as well as political turmoil, Handel composed his Occasional Oratorio - a true occasional work in every sense. Having failed, some years earlier, as an opera impresario, he had by now also suffered setbacks as the producer of his own oratorio performances. Meanwhile, King George II, who had granted him a generous pension, found himself under political and military pressure from the Jacobites, and Handel’s own livelihood suddenly seemed at risk. Thus he seized the opportunity to offer musical support to both the monarch and an anxious London public.

Within an astonishingly short period, the meticulously crafted oratorio was completed and received its premiere on 14 February 1746 in London. Handel drew generously on his own earlier compositions; the result was almost an anthology, a collection of some of his most beautiful and celebrated pieces - a kind of Best of Handel. The sidelined Messiah librettist Charles Jennens fulminated that the oratorio was “a triumph for a victory not yet won,” and that Newburgh Hamilton’s libretto was an unimaginable hodgepodge of John Milton and Edmund Spenser. Yet to today’s audience, the Occasional Oratorio offers magnificent, mostly well‑known melodies, highly virtuosic Baroque arias, deeply moving choruses, and, overall, a late‑Baroque sound world of remarkable richness—unique in its exceptionally compact score. Handel at his best, contemporary listeners might well have exclaimed; and modern audiences, too, are likely to be moved and exhilarated in much the same way.

The virtuosic and vividly colored interpretation captured here - recorded on 11 February 2017 in the Hercules Hall of the Munich Residenz - succeeded in delighting both the audience and the critics alike. Under the direction of Howard Arman, the Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks sang alongside the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, performing on period instruments in historically informed practice, joined by a stylistically assured ensemble of first‑rate native‑speaking soloists. This concert recording also represents the world premiere recording of the Occasional Oratorio based on the historically researched and newly edited score of the Hallische Händel-Ausgabe.

Double CD
Live recording of the performance on 11 February 2017 from the Hercules Hall, Munich

Artists
Julia Doyle, Soprano
Ben Johnson, Tenor
Peter Harvey, Baritone

Chor des Bayerischen Rundfunks
Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin

Howard Arman, Conductor

Released on
BR Klassik, 2017