The Choice of Hercules (Handel)
The Choice of Hercules (HWV 69 ) is an oratorio (Musical Interlude) by Georg Friedrich Händel. It is based on the Greek myth of Heracles at the crossroads.
Formation
The origin of this dramatic cantata of about 40 minutes in length you have to look in the incidental music for Alceste, the Handel composed of 27 December 1749 to January 8, 1750. This project, in which the operator of the Covent Garden Theatre, John Rich, was involved, consisted in a sequence of recitatives, arias, choruses and symphonic deposits for a tragedy of Tobias Smollett.
At a performance of the tragedy or the incidental music, it did not come, although the preparations were already well advanced. Scheibler called as a possible reason the exodus due to a series of earthquakes in London at the turn of 1749 /50. Anthony Hicks is considering a possible over Rich's because of the feared costs.
Much of the music of Handel 's Alceste used for this interlude, in addition he composed some new numbers. The project lasted from June 28 to July 5 in 1750.
The premiere took place in London's Covent Garden Theatre on March 1, 1751. Because the work for a full evening entertainment is not suitable and the oratorio Alexander 's Feast was relatively short one and a half hours, playing Händel The Choice of Hercules as a third act for Alexander 's Feast. This practice he also retained for further performances in 1753 and 1755 at.
The cast at the premiere was as follows:
- Pleasure: Miss Faulkner (soprano )
- Virtue: Cecilia Young- Arne (soprano )
- Hercules: Esther Young ( mezzo-soprano)
Libretto
Who was the librettist, is controversial. The name most frequently cited is that of Thomas Morell, who is responsible both for the previous oratorio Theodora and for the following Jephthah. What is certain is that the text goes back to the seal The Judgement of Hercules by Robert Lowth (Glasgow 1743).
The fabric is widely known as part of the Hercules legend and has often been processed in the art. Johann Sebastian Bach wrote the cantata in 1733 Hercules at the Crossroads ( BWV 213) with the same plot - a rare case that Bach and Handel produced a plant with the same theme and similar form.