Handel: ‘A necromancer in the midst of his own enchantments’

university of toronto quarterly, volume 72, number 4, fall 2003 E L L E N T . H A R R I S Handel: ‘A necromancer in the midst of his own enchantments’ Handel began work on the score of Alcina in the midst of the Lenten season – February and March – of 1735, during which time he was also actively engaged in the presentation of oratorios at the King’s Theatre. In the autograph manuscript he dates the completion of Alcina 8 April 1735. He held the first rehearsal at his own house on 11 April, and the opera premiered seven days later on 18 April. Mrs Delany, a friend of Handel and an ardent admirer of his music, attended the 11 April rehearsal and wrote to her mother the next day: Yesterday morning my sister and I went with Mrs. Donellan to Mr. Handel’s house to hear the first rehearsal of the new opera Alcina. I think it the best he ever made, but I have thought so of so many, that I will not say positively ’tis the finest, but ’tis so fine I have not words to describe it. Strada has a whole scene of charming recitative – there are a thousand beauties. Whilst Mr. Handel was playing his part, I could not help thinking him a necromancer in the midst of his own enchantments. (Delany 1:533–34) Knowing the bare chronology of Alcina’s inception, it is difficult, I think, not to agree with Mrs Delany. Surely Handel must have been ‘a wizard, magician, wonder-worker, [or] conjurer,’ as the Oxford English Dictionary defines ‘necromancer,’ to compose Alcina in the space of about eight weeks (during which time he was also occupied with a critical series of oratorio performances), to begin rehearsals three days after the completion of the opera, and to premiere the work a week after that. But the rapidity of these events, impressive as it may be, does not tell the whole story. Handel composed Alcina in the midst of what was arguably the most stressful and competitive period of his life, and he did so with an eye for drama and a concern for his singers’ particular strengths that would seem, if we did not know otherwise, utterly to belie the speed of composition. In this paper, I seek to document more fully the wondrous achievement of Alcina through an examination of its origins: I first explore in detail the competitive environment of the opera’s inception and then illustrate the compositional care invested in the opera by Handel. Handel’s period of continuous operatic composition in London, lasting twenty-one years, began with the opening of the Royal Academy of Music in 1720. His operas for the Academy typically feature dynastic and political texts thatdepict contested succession or political battles and represent some ‘a necroromancer in the midst of his own enchantments’ 833 university of toronto quarterly, volume 72, number 4, fall 2003 of his best work, including Rodelinda, Tamerlano, and Giulio Cesare. Underwritten at first with significant investments by the king and aristocracy, the Academy closed in 1728, due largely to financial problems. The same year saw the premiere of The Beggar’s Opera, a type of musical comedy known as ballad opera and often cited as one cause of the Academy ’s closing. However, this production was more predictive of things to come than destructive of things past: it parodied Italian opera as well as contemporary politics and politicians, provided musical entertainment in English, and offered a musical style that was familiar and simple. Undeterred by either financial exigency or operatic parody, Handel and his impresario, John Jacob Heidegger, re-established the opera company at the King’s Theatre in 1729 under their own management. However, this company,despitetheking’scontinuedpatronage,wasnolongerconsidered indomitable or even, by certain musical and political groups, desirable. Competition quickly sprang up on two fronts. On one side, in March of 1732, the composers Thomas Arne and John Lampe began producing English operas at the Little Theatre in the Haymarket, and in December, Aaron Hill, one of his former collaborators, wrote to Handel urging that he convert to writing operas in English: ‘My meaning is, that...