The Name of the Lord

Anointed One
1 Samuel 2:35
And I will raise me up a faithful priest,
that shall do according to that which is in mine heart and in my mind:
and I will build him a sure house;
and he shall walk before mine anointed for ever.

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to bring but good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release of the captives,
recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free.
- Isaiah 61:1-3

THE MESSIAH

In a small London house on Brook Street, a servant sighs with resignation as he arranges a tray full of food he assumes will not be eaten. For more than a week, he has faithfully continued to wait on his employer, an eccentric composer, who spends hour after hour isolated in his own room. Morning, noon, and evening the servant delivers appealing meals to the composer and returns later to find the bowls and platters largely untouched.

Once again, he steels himself to go through the same routine, muttering under his breath about how oddly temperamental musicians can be. As he swings open the door to the composer's room, the servant stops in his tracks.

The startled composer, tears streaming down his face, turns to his servant and cries out, "I did think I did see all Heaven before me, and the great God Himself." George Frederic Handel had just finished writing a movement that would take its place in history as the Hallelujah Chorus.

Although Handel wrote his greatest music in England, he suffered personal setbacks there as well. Falling in and out of favor with changing monarchs, competing with established English composers, and dealing with fickle, hard-to-please audiences left him confronting bankruptcy more than once.

Yet Handel retained his sense of humor through virtually any hardship. Once, just as an oratorio of his was about to begin, several of his friends gathered to console him about the extremely sparse audience attracted to the performance. "Never mind," Handel joked to his friends. "The music will sound the better due to the acoustics of the nearly empty hall!

Like his fellow composer Bach, Handel was also renowned as a virtuoso organist. One Sunday, after attending a worship service at a country church, Handel asked the organist if he could play a postlude. As the congregation was leaving the church, Handel played with such expertise that the people reclaimed there seats and refused to leave. The regular organist stopped him, and said that he had better not play the postlude after all if the people were ever to go home.

Audiences for Handel's compositions were unpredictable, and, even the Church of England attacked him for what they considered his notorious practice of writing biblical dramas such as Ether and Israel in Egypt to be performed in secular theaters. His occasional commercial success soon met with financial disaster as rival opera companies competed for the ticket holders of London. He drove himself relentless to recover from one failure after another, and finally his health began to fail. By 1741 he was swimming in debt. It seemed certain he would land in debtor's prison.

On April 8 of that year, he gave what he considered his farewell concert. Miserably discouraged, he felt forced to retire from public activities at the age of fifty-six. Then two unforeseen events converged to change his life. A wealthy friend, Charles Jensen, gave Handel a libretto based on the life of Christ, taken entirely from the bible. He also received a commission from Dublin charity to compose work for a benefit performance.

Handel set to work composing on August 22 in his little house on Brook Street in London. He grew absorbed in the work that he rarely left his room, hardly stopping to eat. Within six days part one was complete. In nine days more he had finished part two, and in another six, part three. The orchestration was completed in another two days. In all 260 pages of manuscript were filled in the remarkable short time of 24 days.

Sir Newman Flower, one of Handel's many biographers, summed up the consensus of history: Consdering the immensity of the world, and the short time involved, it will remain, perhaps forever, the greatest feat in the whole history of music composition." Handel's title for the commissioned work was simply Messiah.

Handel never left his house for those three weeks. A friend who visited him as he composed found him sobbing with intense emotions. Later, as Handel groped for words to describe what he had experienced, he quoted St. Paul, saying "whether I was in the body or out of my body when I wrote it I know not"

Messiah premiered on April 13, 1742 as a charitable benefit, raising 400 pounds and freeing 142 men from debtor's prison. A year later, Handel staged it in London. Controversy emanating from the Church of England continued to plague Handel, yet the King of England attended the performance. As the first notes of the triumphant Hallelujah Chorus rang out, the king rose. Following the royal protocol, the entire audience stood too, initiating a tradition that has lasted more than two centuries.

from Spritual Lives of the Great Composers - Patrick Kavanaugh

Hallelujah Chorus
by George Friedrich Handel

Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth.
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth.
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth.
Hallelujah!
For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
For the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

The kingdom of this world
The kingdom of our Lord,
The kingdom of this world
And of His Christ, and of His Christ;
And He shall reign for ever and ever,
And He shall reign for ever and ever,
And He shall reign for ever and ever,
And He shall reign for ever and ever!

King of kings,
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
And Lord of lords,
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
King of kings,
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
And Lord of lords,
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
King of kings,
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
And Lord of lords,
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

King of kings, and Lord of lords,
And He shall reign,
And He shall reign,
And He shall reign forever, And He shall reign forever and ever,
King of kings, forever and ever,
And Lord of lords,
Hallelujah! Hallelujah!

And He shall reign forever and ever,
King of kings! and Lord of lords!
King of kings! and Lord of lords!
And He shall reign forever and ever,
King of kings! and Lord of lords!
Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!
Hallelujah!