Handel’s first English-language oratorio, Esther, had a rather colourful history. It started life in 1718 as a masque to be performed at Cannons, the home of the Duke of Chandos, the composer’s employer at the time. The masque was then presented, to some acclaim – in a pirated version! – at the Crown and Anchor tavern (we’d now describe it as a music venue) and thus came to the attention – who knows how? – of members of the royal family, who asked the composer to stage it as part of his opera season at the King’s Theatre.
In response, Handel then refashioned and extended the masque into a full scale three act opera. But then the plot thickens, since Edmund Wilson, the then Bishop of London, thinking it sacrilege to re-enact a Biblical story on the stage, banned the performance; and so – to circumvent this ban – Handel had the work given in concert performance (no scenery, no costumes, no stage action) in other words, the first English language oratorio. And thus the good bishop, inadvertently, assisted at the birth of a major British choral tradition.
From Esther:
Saul is one of Handel’s grandest oratorios. Composed to a libretto by Charles Jennens, who also compiled the texts for Messiah, it relates the Old Testament story of Saul and David (First Book of Samuel, Chapters 16–31). It’s in three acts; here’s the first:
00:00:00 – Overture
00:03:43 – Symphony: Larghetto
00:05:48 – Symphony: Organo ad libitum
00:08:20 – Symphony: Allegro [minuet]
00:10:11 – Chorus: How excellent thy name, O Lord
00:13:06 – Air: An infant rais’d by thy Command
00:14:17 – Trio: Along the Monster Atheist strode
00:15:23 – Chorus: The Youth inspir’d by Thee, O Lord
00:17:23 – Chorus: How excellent thy Name, O Lord
00:19:58 – recitative, aria: He Comes, he Comes! O Godlike Youth!
00:22:56 – recitative: Behold, O King, the brave victorious Youth
00:23:46 – Air: O King, your Favours with Delight I take
00:28:13 – recitative: O Early Piety, O Modest Merit!
00:28:40 – Aria: What Abject Thoughts
00:30:46 – recitative: Yet Think on whom ths Honour
00:31:03 – Aria: Birth and Fortune I Despise!
00:35:48 – recitative, aria: Go on, Illustrious Pair! While Yet Thy Tide
00:36:08 – Air: While Yet thy Tide of Blood Runs High
00:38:41 – recitative: Thou, Merab, First in Birth
00:39:01 – Aria: My Soul Rejects the Thought with Scorn
00:40:14 – air cont…: See, see, with what a Scornful Air
00:41:19 – air cont., O Lovely Youth
00:42:09 – Act I scene II sinfonia
00:43:12 – recitative: Already See
00:43:28 – Chorus: Welcome, welcome, Mighty King
00:44:56 – recitative: What do I hear?
00:45:22 – Chorus: David his Ten Thousands Slew
00:45:56 – Accompagnato: To Him Ten Thousands
00:46:13 – Air: With Rage I SHall Burst
00:47:33 – recitative: Imprudent Women
00:48:20 – Air: Fell Rage and Black Despair possessed
00:51:01 – recitative: ’tis but the smallest Part of Harmony
00:51:32 – Accomp. By Thee this Universal Frame
00:54:02 – recitative: Rack’d with Infernal Pains
00:54:15 – Air: O Lord, whose Mercies Numberless
00:58:26 – Harp Symphony
01:00:43 – Recitative: ’tis all in Vain
01:01:01 – Air: A Serpent in my Bosom Warmed
01:03:03 – recitative: Has he escaped my rage?
01:03:27 – Air: Capricious Man
01:07:14 – recitative: O Filial Piety
01:08:57 – Air: No, no Cruel Father, no
01:10:29 – Air: O Lord, whose Providence
01:12:29 – Chorus: preserve him for the glory
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The Art of Listening 