Semele (oratorio)

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Semele is a dramatic oratorio by George Frideric Handel.

In the early 1740s, the performance of oratorios at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, represented George Frideric Handel’s chief concert activity in London. His biblical oratorios — Israel in Egypt (written 1738), Messiah (1741), Samson (1743) among them — bore some relationship to Greek tragedy, and it is perhaps not surprising that he decided to venture into the world of classical drama. He accordingly took up William Congreve's libretto for the 1707 John Eccles opera Semele, writing the music over a two-month period during the summer of 1743. The work was first performed in 1744 at the Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, London.

The work naturally took shape as an opera. Yet Handel, ever shrewd, eyed a place for it on the Theatre Royal's Lenten concert series the following February. Semele was fashioned therefore for presentation "in the manner of an oratorio." Besides securing the work's first performance, on February 10, 1744, and enabling Handel to get paid, the decision also begat a spurious identity for Semele as a concert piece, one much championed and "claimed" by choral groups.

That the work is in fact an opera, and not an oratorio, is manifest in playwright Congreve's libretto, amplified by Alexander Pope, and in the score. As Harewood put it:

" ... the music of Semele is so full of variety, the recitative so expressive, the orchestration so inventive, the characterization so apt, the general level of invention so high, the action so full of credible situation and incident — in a word, the piece as a whole is so suited to the operatic stage — that one can only suppose its neglect to have been due to an act of abnegation on the part of opera companies."

Which brings us to the issue of Semele's long dormancy. To start with, Handel's 1744 camouflaging failed. The audience for the concert series, held yearly during Lent at London's Theatre Royal, Covent Garden — 148 years and two destructive fires later, it would become the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden — expected Bible-based subject matter. Most oratorios, including most of those by Handel, would have met this expectation. But the amorous topic of Semele, which is practically a creation of the late Restoration Period, transparently drew on Greek myths, not Hebrew laws. It displeased those who attended the Lenten seasons for a different kind of uplift, and, being in English, likewise irritated the supporters of true Italian opera. As Winton Dean suggested in his book Handel’s Dramatic Oratorios:

"The public [in 1744] found [Semele's] tone too close to that of the discredited Italian opera and set it down as an oratorio manqué; where they expected wholesome Lenten bread, they received a glittering stone dug from the ruins of Greek mythology."

As a result, only four performances took place. The cast on February 10, 1744, included Elisabeth Duparc (‘La Francesina’) in the title role, Esther Young as Juno (and Ino), and John Beard as Jupiter. Henry Reinhold sang the bass roles. Handel seems to have interchanged some of the music between singers.

Pandering to his critics, Handel did rustle up two further performances, in December 1744, at the King’s Theatre, London. Changes and additions were made, including interspersed arias in Italian (for the opera crowd) and the excision of sexually explicit lines (for the devoted). Then Semele, perhaps unsurely matched to the spirit of its time, fell into long neglect.

1 Modern revivals
2 Arias
3 Recordings
4 External links

[edit] Modern revivals

Handel's Semele had its first stage performance in Cambridge, England, in 1925 and its London stage première in 1954. It was produced on four occasions by the Handel Opera Society under Charles Farncombe (1959, 1961, 1964 and 1975), entered the repertory of the English National Opera (then Sadler’s Wells Opera) in 1970, and returned — after a 238-year wait — to the Royal Opera House in 1982, conducted on the latter two occasions by Charles Mackerras. The American stage première took place at the Ravinia Festival near Chicago in 1959. Semele was performed again in Washington, DC, in 1980, and at Carnegie Hall, New York, with John Nelson conducting, in 1985.

A new production opened at New York City Opera on September 13, 2006, directed by Stephen Lawless and replete with comparisons of Semele to Marilyn Monroe, Jupiter to President Kennedy, and Juno to Jacqueline Kennedy. Elizabeth Futral sang Semele, Vivica Genaux portrayed Juno (and Ino), and Robert Breault sang Jupiter.

[edit] Arias

"Hence, Hence, Iris Hence Away!"
"Hymen, Haste, Thy Torch Prepare!"
"I Am Ever Granting, You Always Complain"
"Leave Me, Loathsome Light"
"Myself I Shall Adore"
"No, No, I’ll Take No Less"
"Oh Jove, In Pity Teach Me Which to Choose"
"Oh Sleep, Why Dost Thou Leave Me?"
"Where E’er You Walk"
"Why Dost Thou Thus Untimely Grieve?"

[edit] Recordings

Johannes Somary, conducting the English Chamber Orchestra, with Sheila Armstrong as Semele, Helen Watts as Juno, and Robert Tear as Jupiter. Smaller roles are sung by Felicity Palmer, Mark Deller, and Justino Díaz. Vanguard Classics, 1973.

John Eliot Gardiner, conducting the English Baroque Soloists and the Monteverdi Choir, with Norma Burrowes as Semele, Della Jones as Juno, and Anthony Rolfe Johnson as Jupiter. Erato Disques, 1983.

John Nelson, conducting the Orchestra of St. Luke's, live in 1985 at Carnegie Hall, New York, with Kathleen Battle and Marilyn Horne. Legendary Recordings.

John Nelson, conducting the English Chamber Orchestra, with Kathleen Battle as Semele, Marilyn Horne as Juno, and John Aler as Jupiter. Silvia McNair, Michael Chance, and Samuel Ramey perform smaller roles. Deutsche Grammophon, circa 1992.