Immediately, from its premiere in Dublin in 1742, Messiah was pronounced a masterpiece. When he finished, he sobbed: “I think that I did see all heaven before me, and the great God Himself!” In other words, in all, two-and-a-half hours of the world’s most magnificent music was composed in less than twenty-five days. The orchestration took him only a few days more. He finished Part II in nine days, and Part III in six days. The result is one of the world’s great masterworks, Messiah. He was, in fact, in the grip of divine inspiration. One servant reported that Handel seldom ate or slept and worked with such frenzy that his fingers could no longer grip his pen. People thought he was mad, or even under a spell. He began composing with a super-human zeal and energy. It was then that something remarkable happened. Handel decided to write a new oratorio.Ī deeply religious man, he turned away from the human foibles common to his operas and chose his text and themes from Scripture. In 1741, he was invited to Ireland to direct one of his works at a charity performance.
![story behind raise a hallelujah story behind raise a hallelujah](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/L4CvJYgt6Yg/maxresdefault.jpg)
When his operas and his health began to fail, Handel sank into bankruptcy and despair, believing his career was over. He was also kind of a large, awkward man, rough and hot-tempered enough to earn the nickname “The Great Bear.” Though his productions were popular in 18th century London, Handel had his enemies - he was a foreigner, born in Germany, by many accounts not a very likeable fellow, and his rivals detested his style of opera.
![story behind raise a hallelujah story behind raise a hallelujah](https://godtv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Raise-a-Hallelujah2-1024x538.gif)
George Frideric Handel was mainly a composer of operas.