Duets
Playing duets makes it possible for keyboard players to sit down together, to play music at a higher level than they are ready to play, because the notes are shared between 2, 3 or even 4 players. And the players can be at different levels in their training, with easier parts for one player and harder parts for the another.
Group piano lessons have proved that playing with another player gives an added incentive to practice and improve.
About this music both well-known and unknown.
Handel is well-known for the Hallelujah Chorus and some arias from his operas. Here are two arias.
Arias
Largo • Xerxes
Aria • Rinaldo
Less well-known are the following aria and the two choruses. The choruses have dramatic, rich endings, and are sung together. The last chord of the first chorus is more of a dramatic pause before continuing, rather than a typical ending.
Aria
Thou Shalt Break Them • Messiah
Choruses
And With His Stripes • Messiah
All We Like Sheep • Messiah
His music for ceremonial events even includes music to be played on a barge floating down a river.
Orchestra
Water Music • Air
Waer Music • Trio
Handel’s compositions for keyboard, both harpsichord and organ, are not as well-known as Bach’s, but they should be, with their intricate fugues, and suite movements with rich harmonies. What differentiates Handel’s music from that of Bach? You may find these pieces to be more emotional. Similar pieces by Bach are very precise, both musically and mathematically.
Keyboard Fugues
Fugue Facile in C
Nr. 1 in G Minor
Keyboard Suites
Allegro • 2nd Suite
Allemande • 5th Suite
Allemande • 3rd Suite
Courante • 8th Suite
Allegro • 4th Suite
About Handel
Handel, like some – if not many – of us came from a non-musical family, and also like some of us, was expected to do something other than be a musician for life.
His father, a Barber/Surgeon, blocked him from accepting a position offered from the court of Berlin to advance his musical education. Instead he was enrolled in school to prepare him to become a lawyer.
After a year, he left school and became a violinist in an opera house in Hamburg. Eventually he went to England, where in 1711 produced his opera Rinaldo in London. Here he became a naturalized citizen and was given a life pension by Queen Anne.
He was an exact contemporary of Bach.
In one way they were opposites. Bach worked in churches, and also wrote some music for the court. Handel wrote some church music, but worked mainly in theaters and for the court.
A few interesting facts about Messiah:
It was written for, and performed in, theaters.
The first performance was a benefit for a hospital.
Quite blind at the end of his life, Handel’s death date is known because of the date on the bill presented by the man who guided him to the theater for a series of Messiah performances. On that date, the billing entries stopped.