While it is a cliché of blogging to apologize for one’s long absence while quietly rejoining the online conversation, nevertheless: apologies! We’re back, with quite a backlog of recently (and not-so-recently) digitized items to tell you about. Let’s begin with some Handel by way of Mozart, shall we?
Title page, Timotheus, oder, die Gewalt der Musik. Merritt Room ML54.H36 A4 1791
Handel, George Frideric, 1685-1759. [Alexander’s feast. Libretto. German]
Timotheus, oder, die Gewalt der Musik : eine grosse Cantate / aus dem Englischen des Dryden übersetzt von Carl Wilhelm Ramler ; in Musik gesetzt von G.F. Händel ; instrumentirt von W.A. Mozart.
Merritt Room ML54.H36 A4 1791
A very rare libretto for Handel’s Alexander’s Feast, arranged by Mozart in the summer of 1790, for a probable performance in 1791. This arrangement (K. 591) was one of four – with Acis and Galatea, Messiah, and Ode for Saint Cecilia’s Day – commissioned by Mozart’s patron Baron von Swieten for the concerts at the Gesellschaft der Associierten.
Find a critical edition of Mozart’s score in the NMA Online (Neue Mozart Ausgabe: Digitized Version). Handel’s manuscript is part of the Ricasoli Collection at the University of Louisville, and is available in the IMSLP, with a 19th century Peters edition of the Mozart arrangement.
-Kerry Masteller