Hercules (Handel)

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Oratorios by George Frideric Handel

Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno (1707) La Resurrezione (1708) Brockes Passion (1715) Esther (1718) Acis and Galatea (1718) Esther (1732) Deborah (1733) Athalia (1733) Alexander's Feast (1736) Il trionfo del Tempo e della Verità (1737) Saul (1738) Israel in Egypt (1738) L'Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato (1740) Messiah (1741) Samson (1741) Semele (1743) Joseph and his Brethren (1743) Hercules (1744) Belshazzar (1744) Occasional Oratorio (1746) Judas Maccabaeus (1746) Joshua (1747) Alexander Balus (1747) Susanna (1748) Solomon (1748) Theodora (1749) The Choice of Hercules (1750) Jephtha (1751) The Triumph of Time and Truth (1757)

Hercules (HWV 60) is a music drama in three acts by George Frideric Handel. The English-language libretto was by Thomas Broughton after the Trachiniae of Sophocles and the Metamorphoses of Ovid.

Contents 1 Performance history 2 Roles 3 E-book 4 Sources

[edit] Performance history

Hercules was first given at the King's Theatre in London on 5 January 1745 in concert style. There were only two performances, but it was repeated in 1749 and 1752. The first modern performance was in Münster in 1925.

In 2002, Anne Sofie von Otter and Gidon Saks starred in a highly acclaimed recording of the work, conducted by Marc Minkowski.

[edit] Roles

		Premiere 1745
Hercules	bass	Thomas Reinhold
Dejanira, wife of Hercules	mezzo-soprano	Miss Robinson
Iole, daughter of the King of Oechalia	soprano	Elisabeth Duparc, called "La Francesina"
Hyllus, son of Hercules	tenor	John Beard
Lichas, a herald	alto	Susanna Maria Cibber

[edit] E-book

Score of Hercules (ed. Friedrich Chrysander, Leipzig 1859) (in English and German)

[edit] Sources

Hercules by Stanley Sadie, in 'The New Grove Dictionary of Opera', ed. Stanley Sadie (London, 1992) ISBN 0-333-73432-7