Krisztina Szabó & that's Curtis Daily  playing his bass underneath her score.

 Handel's Messiah - it's all in the details - Curtis Daily -bassist
Why Handel?
Des-pi-zed & Rejected Superbly

There is so much lore about George Frideric Handel’s Messiah that It is difficult to find stuff that may be unknown or original.

In this past Saturday’s Messiah’s (November 30 , 2019) celebrating not only the arrival of the Christmas season but also Early Music Vancouver’s 50^th anniversary with the Pacific Baroque Orchestra, the Vancouver Cantata Singers and with Ivars Taurins as guest conductor, I ruminated on it. I enjoyed in particular the soloists, Joanne Lunn, soprano, Krisztina Szabó, mezzo-soprano, Thomas Hobbs, tenor and Peter Harvey, baritone.

I asked and Englishman sitting next to me why it was that everybody stood up (my arthritis made that painful so I didn’t) for the Hallelujah Chorus. He told me it was a tradition started by Charles the 5^th.  I doubted the veracity of his answer.

In a Madrid newspaper article (El Mesías de Händel, Mucho Más Que El “Aleluya”) I read that on March 23d, 1743 the first performance of the Messiah in London’s Covent Garden, at the beginning of the Hallelujah Chorus, George II stood up. Protocol dictated that everybody else had to stand up to the king.

In 1940 noted Cuban-born music critic and novelist Alejo Carpentier (he coined the expression “magic realism” in his book La Música en Cuba wrote: …As an example let’s look at the island of Barbados. There we find a completely original civilization with extraordinary culture. We have many notable prose writers there and it was there that I found one of the best essays of the English revolution of Oliver Cromwell. Newspapers are beautifully edited and they include articles about great music in daily collective culture also in radio stations. I believe it is the island where more Handel music is listened to and in particular to the famous Hallelujah Chorus which serves as the theme to one of the local radio stations.

For me what I like about the Messiah is the comfort of experiencing something like my Argentine “milanesas con puré de papas”. It is comfort food.

And yet it is not all comfort. There is lots of melancholy. As I sit in wait for the best part of the Messiah in the second part particularly since it is sung by absolutely fabulous Mezzo-Soprano Kristina Szabó: 

He was despised (I love that word in three syllables!) and rejected of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. He gave his back to the smiters, and his cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: He hid not His face from shame and spitting.   Isaiah 53.3/50.6

I daydream and think of people I often either went to the Messiah with or saw there. These three died. There was particle physicist Eric Vogt, Chan architect Bing Thom and my very good friend Abraham Rogatnick.

I remember going to a concert at the Orpheum with my granddaughter Rebecca when she was 8. She was falling asleep. I told her, “You should never feel guilty about falling asleep to good music. It is a guilty pleasure few know of.”

I look at the many musicians that I know playing in these Vancouver Messiahs.

There is bassist Curtis Daily who wrote this about the Messiah. And just because it makes me smile when I see him,  there is violinist Paul Luchkow who many years ago I saw on a bicycle on Broadway and Hemlock. He was at a light. I had never introduced myself to him. I went up to him and told him, “You look like someone who plays a baroque violin.” He was astounded and could not figure out how I knew. I had gone to a concert of the Pacific Baroque Orchestra in the early 90s.

Every once in a while I will make milanesas con puré de papa. And at least once a year I will be drawn to a performance of the Messiah.

And I must not forget that another good reason to see the Pacific Baroque Orchestra is to spot Marina Hasselberg on cello and see what new hair style she has or if she is wearing fishnets. I was dissapointed that this time around she wasn't. I was not able to notice if Principal Cellist, Nathan Whittaker was munching on eucalyptus leaves. There are persistent rumours that he has a fondness for them. 

This year’s Messiah cemented my love for He was despised (with all three syllables!) sung by Kristina Szabó. I almost equally enjoyed O death, where is thy sting? (in the third part) sung by Szabó and tenor Thomas Hobbs.