We have a very unusual Messiah for you this week.
Handel wrote his oratorio near the end of the Baroque era in 1741, and forty-eight years later Mozart was asked to re-orchestrate it -- to get it with the times so as to appeal to changing musical tastes. This he did.
There is nothing drastic here -- nothing to upset today's Messiah lovers -- but there are several subtle changes, mostly in the orchestration, but also in some of the arias, and of course the language (but you know the words anyway, right?)
Tastes have changed again in the past half century, and Handel's original Baroque scoring is once more the performance standard. The Mozart arrangement is now a musical curiosity that doesn't get heard much anymore. We'll have it, complete and uninterrupted, this Thursday. See what you think.
