Saturday 10 March 2007 at 7:30pm
Sherborne Abbey

An all Handel programme: Dixit Dominus, Chandos Anthem No. 9, Music for the Royal Fireworks and Water Music suites, with period orchestra.
An all Handel programme featuring some of his most exuberant and colourful works.
Dixit Dominus, a setting of Psalm 110, was written when the composer was only 22 and on his first visit to Rome and was clearly designed to show off his ability to write in the Italian style. For five-part chorus, soloists and strings, the piece is full of vocal acrobatics, bright colour and driving energy. The Chandos Anthems are elaborate Psalm settings written about ten years later, when Handel was firmly settled in England and at the time composer-in-residence to the Earl of Carnarvon, who later became Duke of Chandos.
Baroque trumpets and horns abound in our two orchestral works, the Water Music Suites and Music for the Royal Fireworks, probably Handel’s most well known works for orchestra. The Water Music was written as a surprise for George I to be played at a barge party down the Thames in 1717 – Handel was somewhat out of favour with the King, but the latter was delighted enough with the music to forgive him. The Music for the Royal Fireworks dates from 1749 and was written at the request of George II for a large firework display at Whitehall.