What about Handel?

[gonzalo]

Georg Friederich Handel is my second favourite baroque composer ( the first being J.S Bach) .I find his keyboard 8 suites fascinating both to play and to listen to. And  I prefer them on the piano rather than on harpsichord. So I am interested in your opinions on:

1.      What about Handel?
2.      What are your favourite suites or mov.  from suites?
3.      Any other comments you care to make.


My favourite suites are:

Suite nº 1 in A major ( the prelude is a good show off piece and it's also wonderful)
Suite nº 5 in E major ( The Aria in the end is the famous “harmonious blacksmith”)
Suite nº 7 in G minor (listen to the amazing Sarabande)

They are all at an intermediate level of difficulty in general. In addition , they are not so difficult to memorise like J.S Bach's works since counterpoint is not used so much.

You can listen to the Handel suites here https://www.claudiocolombo.net/haendel.htm

Gonzalo.

[pianistimo]

variations on a theme by handel, op 24 by johannes brahms is one of my very favorites.  never played any of the suites.  sometimes transcriptions make things less 'static' - although when he gets into 'arias' there's not so much repetition and predictability.  i love it though, even when predictable.  it 's just hard to get a listening audience for it - always. 

i love the oratorio 'the messiah.'  has to be the best written!  of course, biased slightly.

[gonzalo]

To encourage people to listen to these pieces and comment:

Suite nº 1 in A major: This suite has an amazing prelude with lots of scales. Some of the chords sound better when arpeggiated. After the prelude comes a beautiful and melodic Allemande in binary form. The allemande is in 3 voices. The third movement is a courante in 3/4 time. It’s in 4 voices and in binary form. The fourth movement is a 3 voiced gigue. It’s main difficulty is the arpeggios in both hands. It is a very nice and uplifting gigue.


Suite nº 2 in F major: The suite starts with an achingly beautiful Adagio in F major. This adagio elicits tranquillity and peacefulness to the listener and player. This piece is good for rubato and using ornamentation for expressive purposes. The difficulty is making the ornaments sound nice and clear.
The suite is followed by a very joyful Allegro which is good for technique acquisition. The 3rd mov. is a very short, ornamented Adagio in Dm. The 4th mov. is a brilliant and beautiful fugue in F major. It’s in 4 voices and it’s the fruit of the cake of this suite. So, if you're looking for other fugues other than J.S Bach's , Handel's are really worth listening to.

I will continue later,

Gonzalo

[dutch_pianist]

Chaconne ( I believe HWV 435). Lovely piece. Not that difficult and very rewarding.

[gonzalo]

Chaconne ( I believe HWV 435). Lovely piece. Not that difficult and very rewarding.

Chaconne in G with 20/21 Variations, HWV.435 is a superb piece.

Thanks for replying,
Gonzalo.

[mikey6]

Did you virtually copy Bernard's 'What About Scarlatti' thread and replace the word Scarlatti with Handel?

Domenico Scarlatti is my second favourite baroque composer (the first being J. S. Bach). I find his keyboard sonatas (around 600 of them) exhilarating both to play and to listen to. And contrary to purists, I prefer them on the piano than on the harpsichord. So I am interested on your opinions on:

1.      What about Scarlatti?
2.      What are your favourite sonatas?
3.      What are your favourite recordings of them?
4.      What do you think of Ralph Kirkpatrick’s idea that they should be played in pairs?
5.      Any other comments you care to make.

My ten favourite sonatas (at the moment) are:
1.      K1 in D minor
2.      K27 in B minor
3.      K24 in A major
4.      K69 in F minor
5.      K87 in B minor
6.      K 141 in D minor
7.      K213 in D minor
8.      K427 in G major
9.      K443 in D major
10.      K492 in D major

Georg Friederich Handel is my second favourite baroque composer ( the first being J.S Bach) .I find his keyboard 8 suites fascinating both to play and to listen to. And  I prefer them on the piano rather than on harpsichord. So I am interested in your opinions on:

1.      What about Handel?
2.      What are your favourite suites or mov.  from suites?
3.      Any other comments you care to make.


My favourite suites are:

Suite nº 1 in A major ( the prelude is a good show off piece and it's also wonderful)
Suite nº 5 in E major ( The Aria in the end is the famous “harmonious blacksmith”)
Suite nº 7 in G minor (listen to the amazing Sarabande)

[gonzalo]

Did you virtually copy Bernard's 'What About Scarlatti' thread and replace the word Scarlatti with Handel?

My writing is terrible, Bernhard's isn't ... I don't copy just to plagiarise


Suite nº 3 in Dm: A virtuosic prelude in Dm opens this suite. It’s actually a kind of toccata and it’s tempo indication is Presto. It’s followed by an Allegro, which is actually a fugue in 4 voices. The 3rd movement is an allemande in Dm, which has a melancholic sound to it. A masterpiece.
After the allemande comes a courante in Dm. The 5th mov. is an air with 5 variations in Dm.
The suite closes with a powerful and incredible Presto.

Gonzalo.

[gonzalo]

Suite no. 4 in Em (14 minutes aprox.): The suite opens with a fugue in Em. After the fugue, this suite follows the usual progression of dances: allemande, courante, sarabande, gigue. The sarabande and the gigue are superb and very danceable.

Suite nº 5 in E (14 minutes aprox.):  This suite starts with a beautiful prelude very useful to practice phrasing. The 2nd movement is a wonderful and happy allemande. The 3rd movement is a Courante in binary form.The 4th movement is the famous aria “Harmonious Blacksmith” with 5 variations. An all time favourite. The last variation is very impressive. It’s worth learning the whole suite.


Gonzalo

[ptmidwest]

Thank you, Gonzalo.  My studio teacher here (she's "PTMidswest"--we all go online on her name, BTW) says she's all for it, having us get some more Handel  in our reps, but can you tell me what level of difficulty these pieces are?  We are not all the same level.  Thanks.