A MESSAGE FROM THE COMPOSER
It has been nearly 20 years in the making, and I’m so delighted that Messyah, my re-imagined version of Handel’s Messiah, is now complete! All 51 movements of the original oratorio now exist in new forms (and some have alternative versions I and II, too). What a joy it has been for me to create this score. Whether you are familiar with Handel’s music or not, whatever religious understanding you may or may not find in the Biblical texts, whatever your musical preferences and cultural background, I fervently hope that Messyah will delight, or move, or provoke, or entertain, or console, or amuse, or challenge you, or speak to you in some new way. Maybe even “more than one of the above”.
Thank you to Sanford Dole and Eric K, directors of the Bay Choral Guild and Redwood Symphony Orchestra, for making this possible, and for believing in the project. My gratitude also to all the performers for their talent and commitment.
Several people have asked why I feel there is a need to re-write one of the best-known and best-loved works in the entire classical music canon. There is no need. I just wanted to do it. (Actually I did once say, to a group of musicians at a rather conservative institution, that I was re-writing Handel’s oratorio because obviously he didn’t do a very good job first time around. Stunned silence around the table. “Only joking,” I hastily added.) Every time a piece of music is played live, it is slightly different, so in a way Messyah is just rather different-er than most of the Messiahs one hears. Compare the sound of Beecham’s 1957 recording with William Christie’s of 1994: we can tell that it’s same piece of music, but what a huge difference in sound and character. Now, if one can alter almost all aspects of a written piece (dynamics, tempo, instrumentation, phrasing, language) it seems but a small step, and not at all revolutionary, to change some of the notes, too. Handel’s oratorio has already been re-arranged many times, not least by the man himself, who adapted the work for new soloists and different occasions—Christopher Hogwood suggests that there are 19 versions by the composer. Then there’s Mozart’s orchestration, and other more grandiose scorings throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In recent decades, there have been many new approaches: the easy-listening Young Messiah album (1976), A Soulful Celebration by Quincy Jones and colleagues (1992), West Yorkshire Playhouse’s Carnival Messiah (2007), Messiah XXI with Gladys Knight, Roger Daltrey, and Chaka Khan (2006). Neil Diamond recorded the Hallelujah Chorus on his Christmas Album II(1994), on whose album sleeve both Hallelujah and Joy to the World are credited as “Trad, arranged Neil Diamond”—poor old Georg is not even mentioned. All this goes to show how Baroque music, in general, is extremely adaptable and resilient. We can enjoy Bach on Moog synthesizers, or in Swingle Singers arrangements, just as much as the myriad “authentic” or “straight” versions that are available.
I really love Messiah, and imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. It’s because I love Messiah that I want to change it. Is that possibly true in our human relationships, too, I wonder? Those we don’t love we ignore to get on with whatever they’re doing, but the more we love, the more, paradoxically, we try to change. In fact, we can’t “be involved” without changing the object of our affections. Isn’t this something we learn from quantum theory—we can’t, at the smallest level, observe reality without our very observation affecting what we see? Disclaimer: these are rambling thoughts of a composer-arranger, and it’s highly likely I’m wrong with the scientific theory, let alone the cod-relationship guidance. Way out of my depth here!
—Paul Ayres, November, 2017
Thank you to Sanford Dole and Eric K, directors of the Bay Choral Guild and Redwood Symphony Orchestra, for making this possible, and for believing in the project. My gratitude also to all the performers for their talent and commitment.
Several people have asked why I feel there is a need to re-write one of the best-known and best-loved works in the entire classical music canon. There is no need. I just wanted to do it. (Actually I did once say, to a group of musicians at a rather conservative institution, that I was re-writing Handel’s oratorio because obviously he didn’t do a very good job first time around. Stunned silence around the table. “Only joking,” I hastily added.) Every time a piece of music is played live, it is slightly different, so in a way Messyah is just rather different-er than most of the Messiahs one hears. Compare the sound of Beecham’s 1957 recording with William Christie’s of 1994: we can tell that it’s same piece of music, but what a huge difference in sound and character. Now, if one can alter almost all aspects of a written piece (dynamics, tempo, instrumentation, phrasing, language) it seems but a small step, and not at all revolutionary, to change some of the notes, too. Handel’s oratorio has already been re-arranged many times, not least by the man himself, who adapted the work for new soloists and different occasions—Christopher Hogwood suggests that there are 19 versions by the composer. Then there’s Mozart’s orchestration, and other more grandiose scorings throughout the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In recent decades, there have been many new approaches: the easy-listening Young Messiah album (1976), A Soulful Celebration by Quincy Jones and colleagues (1992), West Yorkshire Playhouse’s Carnival Messiah (2007), Messiah XXI with Gladys Knight, Roger Daltrey, and Chaka Khan (2006). Neil Diamond recorded the Hallelujah Chorus on his Christmas Album II(1994), on whose album sleeve both Hallelujah and Joy to the World are credited as “Trad, arranged Neil Diamond”—poor old Georg is not even mentioned. All this goes to show how Baroque music, in general, is extremely adaptable and resilient. We can enjoy Bach on Moog synthesizers, or in Swingle Singers arrangements, just as much as the myriad “authentic” or “straight” versions that are available.
I really love Messiah, and imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. It’s because I love Messiah that I want to change it. Is that possibly true in our human relationships, too, I wonder? Those we don’t love we ignore to get on with whatever they’re doing, but the more we love, the more, paradoxically, we try to change. In fact, we can’t “be involved” without changing the object of our affections. Isn’t this something we learn from quantum theory—we can’t, at the smallest level, observe reality without our very observation affecting what we see? Disclaimer: these are rambling thoughts of a composer-arranger, and it’s highly likely I’m wrong with the scientific theory, let alone the cod-relationship guidance. Way out of my depth here!
—Paul Ayres, November, 2017
