HANDEL: Alexander's Feast

St Georges Singers, Poynton

St George's Singers with Baroque in the North

Neil Taylor Conductor

Lizzy Humphries Soprano

Joseph Buckmaster Tenor

Graham McCusker Bass

Free pre-concert talk at 6:45pm

By 1736 opera was no longer financially lucrative and Handel was in financial straits. The ode Alexander’s Feast marked a turning point in his fortunes.

Based on a poem by John Dryden, it describes a banquet held by Alexander the Great in the captured Persian city of Persepolis, during which the musician Timotheus sings and plays his lyre, inciting Alexander to burn the city down in revenge for the death of his Greek soldiers.

With three concertos inserted between the vocal sections, and a final grandiose choral fugue, it was a great success, and persuaded Handel to abandon Italian opera in favour of English choral music.