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£8,000

Music in the Brickhills 2009 Series - 2010 Messiah

St Mary the Virgin, Great Brickhill - 26th September 2010, 7.30pm

This year sees the fourth year of the annual performance of Handel’s Messiah.  Each year the performance varies a little; some arias and choruses are included and others omitted.  Each year different local singers, all giving their time for free, perform the solo parts.  This year will be no different with a different line-up of soloists and numbers from last year.

The performance to a packed church last year nearly brought the house down and Director of Music Jerry Breslin asked the orchestra and chorus to perform the Hallelujah chorus for a second time.  We are aiming for a similarly high standard this year.

Messiah (not The Messiah) was written by Handel in 1741, reputedly in 21 days. The libretto was compiled by Jennens, being a collation of quotations from the King James Version of the Bible. Neither Jennens or Handel regarded Messiah as a religious work. Messiah was composed specifially for a series of oratorio concerts that Handel was putting on in Spring 1742, in Dublin.

Handel's original plan had been to ask some of the choristers from Dublin Cathedrel to sing. The Dean of the Cathedral (Jonathan Swift - author of Gulliver's Travels) refused to let any of his choristers take part in "Mr Handel's little entertainment" on the grounds that there was insufficient religious content. Undeterred, Handel recruited choristers from the Cathedral in Chester, where he was waiting to take the boat to Ireland. He asked the choirmaster for choristers who could "sing by sight". Handel himself relates the story that while waiting in Chester for the storms to abate, he began rehearsals for Messiah in the Bear, and was much put out that his bass was unable to sightread "Why do the Nations". He enjoyed the response of the bass - that he could sing at sight , but "not first sight".