Handel's Treasures - Music in Dialogue

buy ticket

Jean Baptiste Lully is considered the epitome of French Baroque music, a pioneer of modern orchestral music and the inventor of the tragédie lyrique. He was undoubtedly the most famous musician at the court of the "Sun King" Louis XIV - although it is often overlooked that Lully was not a native Frenchman, but was actually born in Florence. Whether French or not, Lully's work continued to exert a formative influence on subsequent generations long after his death - not least on George Frideric Handel. This can be seen most clearly in Handel's numerous French overtures, which always follow Lully's pattern: with a gravitationally slow first section characterized by dotted rhythms, a faster, fugal second section, a repetition of these two sections and a short concluding third section that is again pathetically solemn. According to a travel report by a French musician, Handel's extensive music library in 1746/47 contained not only the works of Handel's contemporaries such as Jean-Marie Leclair and Jean-Philippe Rameau, but also all of Jean-Baptiste Lully's operas published up to that point. Many of his own operas are also based on the same literary models that Lully had already set to music - so his influence on Handel's work cannot be denied. For further information and insights into this fascinating topic, please visit our annual exhibition "Charme-Esprit-Galanterie - Handel and France".

---

Organizer: Händelfestspielorchester Halle in cooperation with the Handel House Foundation

Reduction for pupils, students, trainees, severely disabled persons and - only at the box office - for members of the Freundes- und Förderkreis des Händel-Hauses zu Halle e. V. (Friends and Sponsors of the Halle Handel House).

Reserved concert tickets must be picked up at the museum box office in the Handel House up to 30 minutes before the start of the event.

---

Handel's Treasures - Music in Dialogue

The discussion concert series HÄNDELS SCHÄTZE - MUSIK IM DIALOG, which has already been taking place successfully for 17 years, is a joint production of the Händelfestspielorchester Halle and the Händel-Haus Foundation.
A special programme selection featuring Handel's music and that of his contemporaries is framed by short informative discussion rounds. The pivotal point for the dialogues between musicians, restorers and musicologists will be exhibits from the collections of the Handel House Foundation that match the programme, be it historical musical instruments or objects from the graphics and picture collection.

In the 2023/24 season, the bass viola da gamba, which is based on a reworked cello by Tomáš Ondrej Hulínský, will be presented, as well as the copperplate engraving "Dom zu Halle" by J. G. Krügner (1749), an anonymous oil painting with a portrait of Beethoven (late 19th century) and a copperplate engraving with a portrait of J.-B. Lully by J. L. Roullet (around 1690).