Interview with George Fredrick Handel
Q: Tell me about the place and times you
lived.
A: I was born February 23, 1685, in
Halle, Germany. When I was 18 I went to Hamburg Germany to play violin in
the Hamburg Goosemarket Theater. After that, I stayed in Italy for three opera
seasons and then moved to England because I had the opportunity to perform for
English royalty, including Queen Anne and King George I.
Q: What events in your early life made you get
interested in the arts?
A: I always wanted to study music but my father
didn’t think that I could make a living from music. My mother, on the other
hand, supported my desire to play music. I wanted to play so bad that I
secretly got a clavichord and played it in the attic when my parents where sleeping.
I was lifted onto an organ stool, where I first showed people my skill,
everyone was amazed with my playing ability at such a young age.
Q: What role did mentors play in helping
you develop the interests and talents you have as an artist?
A: One of my first mentors was
Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow, he was a big help to me learning to compose and play
music. Zachow did a lot of composing for churches and that definitely
influenced me greatly. He taught me how to play and compose for the oboe,
violin, harpsichord, and the organ.
Q: What was the world of art like in your
particular field of art when you entered it?
A: I was very fortunate to live in a time that
when I traveled to Florence, Italy WHY . I got the opportunity to meet
many famous composers. I was trying to make Florence Italy's musical capital.
While I was in Italy, I met librettist Antonio Salvi who influenced me a lot
later on.
Q: How did the major cultural, economical and
political situations of the time impact your work?
A: There were a lot of new social and
political ideas going on at the time, and with that new music ideas and
boundaries where being pushed like they never were before. More people where
writing operas, which is a good thing for opera because it was spreading its
popularity.
Q: What where your major accomplishments
and the methods you used?
A: One of my best accomplishments is Rinaldo, a
piece I wrote for the King’s Theatre. The method I used was to use new elements
not many people where doing at the time such as different harmonies and counter
point which I learned from Zachow. Rinaldo is the piece that really established
me as one of the great composers of my time.
Q: What where the key opportunities you
had that led to turning points in your life and art?
A: The major opportunity I had was
studying with Friedrich Wilhelm Zachow, because he taught basically taught me
everything I know. In my free time, I taught lessons to pass on what he taught
me because so much of my music comes from what I have learned from him.
Q: What hardships or roadblocks did you
have to overcome in order to be an artist?
A: My father was a huge setback because
he didn’t want me to study music. Instead he wanted me to study law and I did
for a while. He didn’t believe that I could make a living composing music. But
obviously that isn’t the case.
Q: What personal stories best illustrate
how you became successful in the arts?
A: My father was one of them because it made me
want to work harder to show him that I could be successful in the arts. Another
was the temporary banning of opera in some places like Rome, which was a huge
setback when trying to spread the opera scene.
Q: How did your work impact the world of
art?
A: My music helped build up the opera scene,
which would have failed if it weren’t for me and the other composers at the
time that where producing great music such as Johann Sebastian Bach.
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