DAILY DOSE of BEETHOVEN (October 28, 2020)
Although Beethoven was very clear about his love for J.S. Bach, whom he called “the father of all harmony”, and joked that his name should rather be ocean (Meer) rather than brooklet (Bach); he more than once reported that he found George Frederic Handel (1695-1759) to be the greatest of all composers.
"To him, I bow the knee." Why?
Mozart studied both Bach and Handel in 1782 at the salon of Baron van Swieten, and in 1789, he reorchestrated Handel’s “Messiah", utilizing advances made in instruments since the time (when asked about Mozart's version of Handel’s "Messiah" though, Beethoven remarked that it would have lived without Mozart's improvements).
Mozart said of Handel: “Handel understands effect, better than any of us— when he chooses he strikes like a thunderbolt.”
This dramatic capability of Handel's was addressed in yesterday’s discussion of his aria: "Total Eclipse." Mozart quotes Handel's Messiah directly in his Requiem. The fugal opening of the Kyrie, is a direct quote from “And with his Stripes" in the Messiah.
Beethoven quotes the “Hallelujah” chorus in the Agnus Dei movement of his Missa Solemnis, and the 16 year-old Felix Mendelssohn quoted the same passage in his Octet.
We provide a six-minute audio report, to make the references clear.
https://drive.google.com/…/11hNEw-QXyo_errkoR1RrEjKyTn…/view