Belshazzar (Handel)
Belshazzar (HWV 61; German Belshazzar ) is an oratorio in three parts by Georg Friedrich Händel.
Formation
The emergence of Belshazzar can be understood within the context of a traditional exchange of letters between Handel and his librettist Charles Jennens. For the 1745er season Handel was planning two new oratorios. The composition of the first of Hercules he began on 19 July 1744. Already on June 9, he had Jennens asking us to send the first act of Belshazzar. On the day when he began Hercules, he wrote again a letter to Jennens, thanked him for sending me and said " Your Reasons for the length of the first act are interely satisfactory to me, and it is Likewise my opinion to have the Following acts short ".
Apparently Jennens could not keep up with Handel's pace. Already on August 21, introduced Handel Hercules completed and announced that he had received the text for the second act, and impatiently waiting for the third. The setting he began on 23 August and presented the first act in the third, the second on September 10 finished. Three days later, he urged the librettist to send him the outstanding act.
On October 3, he finally expressed his gratitude for the preservation of the rest of the text, but he had to cut so as not to make the oratory too long. A date for the completion of Act 3 is missing, but according to Jennens the Oratory was completed on October 23. The premiere took place at the King's Theatre on 27 March 1745.
Libretto
The main source for the libretto was the book of Daniel ( Dan 5), in which the events around the Sesachfest (see omen ) described, along with Isaiah 13 and Jeremiah 25 Other historical sources are Herodotus ( Histories I, 185 ff ), in the particular shape of the Nitocris appears that does not occur in the Bible text, and Xenophon ( Kyra paideia IV, 6 and XII, 13).
People
Handel composed the oratorio for the following ensemble:
- Belshazzar: John Beard (tenor )
- Gobrias: Thomas Reinhold ( bass)
- Nitocris: Elisabeth Duparc, called La France Sina (soprano )
- Cyrus: Mrs. Robinson (mezzo- soprano)
- Daniel: Susanna Maria Cibber ( alto)
Because of the illness of Mrs. Cibber had to be made for the premiere of several line-up changes. Mrs. Robinson now sang Daniel, whose part had to be adapted to the higher pitch of Robinson. Thomas Reinhold now sang the Cyrus. The role of Gobrias was divided: one part was sung by John Beard, who was also responsible for the title role, an aria was assigned to the Cyrus.