Handel Messiah

hautbois · Post by **hautbois** » Tue May 16, 2006 4:13 am

For the first time i finished the a complete Messiah recording performed by The English concert & Choir on period instruments with Trevor Pinnock, Archiv production recording. It was superb. My question is, which modern instrument recording of this particular work stands ultimate?

Howard

Gary · Post by **Gary** » Tue May 16, 2006 4:24 am

Well, I don't know whether Sir Colin Davis' version with the London Symphony Orchestra is the "ultimate" recording on modern instruments, but it's certainly excellent.

RebLem · Post by **RebLem** » Tue May 16, 2006 7:36 am

IMNSHO, the very best recording of Handel's Messiah is the Mackerras recording with the English Chamber Orch and the Ambrosian Singers. Soloists are Elizabeth Harwood, Paul Esswood, Robert Tear, Raimund Herincx, and the imcomparable Janet Baker in a 1967 performance.

Handel left many of the performing details to conductors and performers, including, in many cases, whether a particular number was to be done by a soloist or a chorus. One of the problems with the Colin Davis recording, IMO, is that in far too many cases, Davis makes the choice of a chorus instead of a soloist. So they work has a sense of unrelieved monumentailty, while the personality imparted by soloists is woefully absent throughout.

david johnson · Post by **david johnson** » Tue May 16, 2006 7:48 am

beecham/rca. listen to it in disguise

and let no purist know you have it!!
i think it's great fun, but i keep a standard performance of choruses around just so i won't go to hell for my dastardly taste.

dj

Ralph · Post by **Ralph** » Tue May 16, 2006 9:37 am

david johnson wrote:beecham/rca. listen to it in disguise and let no purist know you have it!!
i think it's great fun, but i keep a standard performance of choruses around just so i won't go to hell for my dastardly taste.

dj

*****

I was about to make the same recommendation. Sir Thomas is way over the top and his performance is unique.

hautbois · Post by **hautbois** » Tue May 16, 2006 10:11 am

The mezzo in my recording is Anne Sophie von Otter whom is amazing. Must get Janet Baker..must...must....

Richard · Post by **Richard** » Tue May 16, 2006 11:15 am

I agree with RebLem...the C. Mackerras and English Chamber Orch has been my favorite Messiah through the years. I don't believe it is still available..a great one to have re-released. Another to recommend is Martin Pearlman, with the Boston Baroque, on the Telarc label (CD-80322). The overall singing is superb.

Post by **Corlyss_D** » Tue May 16, 2006 7:42 pm

Gary wrote:Well, I don't know whether Sir Colin Davis' version with the London Symphony Orchestra is the "ultimate" recording on modern instruments, but it's certainly excellent.

This is my favorite version. The first time I heard it, it changed my life.

RebLem · Post by **RebLem** » Tue May 16, 2006 9:30 pm

Richard wrote:I agree with RebLem...the C. Mackerras and English Chamber Orch has been my favorite Messiah through the years. I don't believe it is still available..a great one to have re-released. Another to recommend is Martin Pearlman, with the Boston Baroque, on the Telarc label (CD-80322). The overall singing is superb.

Well, TY, Richard.

Mackerras has recorded the Messiah 4 times, at least--the recording I recommend is available (?) in the US from ArkivMusic as a Special Order item, and, as many as you know, that may or may not mean that it is available. I'll give you a clue, though--the title of the work is in 3 languages on the cover, but the most prominent is French. Perhaps a perusal of a French online source would prove productive.

Anyway, this is only one of 4 Messiah's Mackerras has recorded, bur probably the best one.

Another is one with Philip Landridge, Robert Lloyd and the 2 Felicities, Lott and Palmer. Two reasons why it is probably not as good, though I haven't heard it--first, it was recorded with the Royal Phil, an ensemble less well suited than the ECO for this repertoire, it seems to me, and secondly, I find it hard to conceive of anyone approaching the supreme artistry of Dame Janet, especially her wrenching and heartbreaking take on "He was despised."

The other two versions are both recordings of the Mozart orchestration, one of them with the second set of soloists asnd orch & chorus, and the first with Edith Mathis, Birgit Finnila, Peter Schreier, & Theo Adam, and the Austrian RSO & Chorus.

Thank you for the Pearlman recommendation. I only have 5 recordings of it besides the Mackerras and there is room for a few more. I have the classic Malcolm Sargent recording, which I would recommend for a traditional choice in lieu of the Colin Davis, which I also have. Then there is the Marriner performance which follows the 1743 London performance choices; for me, Elly Ameling is the big attraction here. Then, there is the Solti, CSO recording, much better and more idiomatic than you might expect, and the worst of them, a modern, reduced forces original instruments version on Harmonia Mundi conducted by Nicholas McGegan. The attraction here was that it is on 3 CDs and contains choices--performances of all the different alternate takes on particular numbers from, I think, nine different performances in Handel's lifetime with a claim to authenticity. It is programmable, and you can design your own preferred edition. However, it is VERY anemic. He uses 3 female and 3 male soloists; the 3 female soloists and its programmability are the bright spots here, but overall, it is eminently forgettable.

I would like to get that Beecham, and the one performance I have heard of that may exceed it in the "over the top outrageous" department, one by Antal Dorati that features, I believe, a thousand performers, mostly a huge, monster chorus. But I'm also going to be looking out for that Pearlman. I already have and like his performances of the Bach Brandenburgs and Orchestral Suites.

Oh, btw--Arkiv lists 3 different Beecham performances. Which is the one to get?

Post by **Corlyss_D** » Wed May 17, 2006 12:45 am

david johnson wrote:beecham/rca. listen to it in disguise and let no purist know you have it!!
i think it's great fun, but i keep a standard performance of choruses around just so i won't go to hell for my dastardly taste.

dj

{{{{{Shudder}}}}} What a horrible thought! Rather like a Tom Cruise festival . . . .

david johnson · Post by **david johnson** » Wed May 17, 2006 4:27 am

reblem:

http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/alb ... bum_id=486

corlyss:

'What a horrible thought! Rather like a Tom Cruise festival . . . '

heh heh heh...Tom Cruise fest...

War of the Worlds was pretty good, he didn't hurt it.
The ghost of Beecham past is lurking at your door, slinking it's way into your sound system even as you read this...woe woe woe Corlyss!

dj

RebLem · Post by **RebLem** » Wed May 17, 2006 11:35 am

david johnson wrote:reblem:

http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/alb ... bum_id=486

corlyss:

'What a horrible thought! Rather like a Tom Cruise festival . . . '

heh heh heh...Tom Cruise fest...
War of the Worlds was pretty good, he didn't hurt it.
The ghost of Beecham past is lurking at your door, slinking it's way into your sound system even as you read this...woe woe woe Corlyss!

dj

TY, David.

As for the rest, its not as bad as my big coffee table book of African photos by Leni Riefenstahl.

Post by **Corlyss_D** » Wed May 17, 2006 12:21 pm

david johnson wrote:The ghost of Beecham past is lurking at your door, slinking it's way into your sound system even as you read this...woe woe woe Corlyss!

dj

'Twould be worth it if he fired a barb or two at me. What a funny guy he was! I still wouldn't want to hear his Messiah unless I were heavily sedated.

Post by **Corlyss_D** » Wed May 17, 2006 12:24 pm

RebLem wrote: its not as bad as my big coffee table book of African photos by Leni Riefenstahl.

And what, prithee, is a good liberal like you doing with anything by Leni Riefenstahl?

karlhenning · Post by **karlhenning** » Wed May 17, 2006 1:11 pm

Ralph wrote:I was about to make the same recommendation.

Listening to it in disguise? :-)

DavidRoss · Post by **DavidRoss** » Wed May 17, 2006 1:54 pm

Corlyss_D wrote:{{{{{Shudder}}}}} What a horrible thought! Rather like a Tom Cruise festival . . . .

And some find it hard to conceive of Hell....

Richard Mullany · Post by **Richard Mullany** » Fri May 19, 2006 2:55 pm

The RCA Beecham release was over the top in more ways than one. The production was from Cetra Soria and featured illustrations with gold tipping by hand to accompany the libretto.
The Eugene Goosens version of the music was used. Beecham wrote some program notes in which he stated his belief that, were Handel alive today (1959?), he would use the orchestral forces available to him.
I also have the Toronto Symphony/ London version, the more traditional version employing a large orchestra and while it's ok I rarely play it.
I attended performances of this music at Ann Arbor for more years than I remember and heard it done every way imaginable. I agree with Sir Thomas; this piece is big; it may not need an army to perform it but why not think big?. Maybe Handel would approve.

Post by **Corlyss_D** » Fri May 19, 2006 3:31 pm

Richard Mullany wrote: but why not think big?. Maybe Handel would approve.

The showman in him might, but I can tell you the audience in me wouldn't. I've heard enough of "big" Messiahs to last me several lifetimes. I've mentioned before here that when I first heard the Davis in 1967, I threw out the Klemperer that I had bought just a few weeks before.

Haydnseek · Post by **Haydnseek** » Fri May 19, 2006 3:55 pm

Mozart improved it!

Werner · Post by **Werner** » Fri May 19, 2006 7:59 pm

You'd probably find a purist or two to argue with that. But just maybe Wolfgang was in the group of great musicians who paid their respects to their predecessors - one of the greatest, if not the greatest - but that would place him in the line that continued with, to name a few, Busoni, Stokowski, and Beecham. For that matter, Bach was active in that area in his day. I'm not aware that Handel was.

So one may not like some of these late revisions of earlier masterworks - that's still a matter of individal judgment, but you can't read them out of the literature.

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