Handel – Page 5 – The Idle Woman

The Rehearsal Room with its harpsichord

Although I’ve lived and worked in Central London for eight years, I’d never been to Handel House before; but this morning I went to the Queen’s Gallery to see their First Georgians exhibition before it closed, and this offered the perfect complement. All in all, it was a very Georgian day out. The contrast between the two views of 18th-century London was telling. The Queen’s Gallery understandably presents a very elevated view of the period – paintings, furniture, battles and politics – whereas Handel House offers a glimpse of a more down-to-earth, scurrilous, energetic London: a ‘teeming, filthy, vibrant city’, the largest metropolis in Europe, full of appealingly larger-than-life characters. It is only a glimpse, but it leaves you keen to find out more about the personalities you encounter.

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★★★★

(English National Opera with Michael Hofstetter, until 3 October 2014)

This was all rather spontaneous. Having heard good things about the ENO’s current production of Handel’s Xerxes, I managed to get a last-minute ticket up in the balcony for Friday night and headed off for my inaugural Handel opera. It wasn’t at all what I was expecting it to be like. It was lyrical rather than bombastic; humorous rather than noble; and full of the kind of bubbly wit that made it feel disconcertingly like The Marriage of Figaro. I knew virtually none of the music: the only aria I had to hand on my tablet was Se bramate d’amar vi chi sdegna from Cencic’s Handel album. It turned out of course that I knew another aria as well: it was a bit of a surprise when the opera opened with Ombra mai fù. (No, I didn’t know it was sung to a plane tree either: you learn something every day.)

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