Happy birthday, Master Frideric Handel!

O jovem Handel ao cravo
caixa de cigarros da marca Famous Minors (1935)

Quando lhe perguntaram porque é que “roubava” música ao compositor italiano Bononcini para introduzi-la nas suas próprias composições, Handel respondeu:

It's much too good for him; he did not know what to do with it.

Um cantor inglês, chamado Gordon queixava-se do método de acompanhamento de Handel ao cravo, e como Handel insistia em acompanhá-lo da mesma maneira, o cantor ameaçou saltar em cima do instrumento e parti-lo em pedaços. Handel respondeu-lhe:

Oh! Let me know when you will do that, and I will advertise it. For I am sure more people will come to see you jump, than to hear you sing.

Certa vez a grande diva italiana Francesca Cuzzoni (soprano) recusou-se a cantar a ária Falsa imagine da sua ópera Ottone, re di Germania. John Mainwaring, seu biógrafo, conta-nos que:

Having one day some words with CUZZONI on her refusing to sing “Falsa imagine” in OTTONE; Oh! Madame (said he) je scais [sic.] bien que Vous êtes une véritable Diablesse: mais je Vous ferai sçavoir, moi, que je suis Beelzebub le Chéf des Diables. With this he took her up by the waist, and, if she made any more words, swore that he would fling her out of the window.

Acerca da composição do famoso coro “Hallelujah” do Messias, Handel terá dito:

Whether I was in my body or out of my body as I wrote it I know not. God knows.

G. Hogath em Musical History conta-nos:

“When Messiah was first performed in London (1743), when the chorus struck up, 'For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth' ['Hallelujah Chorus'], reportedly the audience and King [George II] stood and remained standing untill the chorus had ended. Some days after the first performance, Handel visited Lord Kinnoul. His lordship paid him compliments on "the noble entertainment". Handel is said to have remarked,

My Lord, I should be sorry if I only entertained them; I wished to make them better.”

Apesar de se ter naturalizado inglês, e ele mesmo se ter tornado uma glória nacional, os seus problemas com a língua inglesa sempre foram um motivo de intermináveis anedotas e malentendidos. John Taylor, Jr. em Records of My Life conta-nos:

I heard him [Morell] say that one fine summer morning he was roused out of bed at five o'clock by Handel, who came in his carriage a short distance from London. The doctor went to the window and spoke to Handel, who would not leave his carriage. Handel was at the time composing an oratorio. When the doctor asked him what he wanted, he said,

"What de devil means de vord [word] billow?"

which was in the oratorio the doctor has written for him. The doctor, after laughing at so ludicrous a reason for disturbing him, told him that billow meant wave, a wave of the sea.

"Oh, de vave",

said Handel, and bade his coachman return, without addressing another word to the doctor.

Handel era um homem muito alto, muito corpulento, características que o tornavam igualmente famoso. Tamanha corpulência requeria muito alimento. Certa vez, querendo jantar num restaurante, pediu um jantar para três pessoas. Mas a espera tornou-se tão longa que ele insistiu com o criado de mesa:

Why do you keep me so long waiting?

O prestável criado respondeu:

We are waiting till the company arrives.

Then bring up the dinner, prestissimo, - ordenou Handel - I am the company.

A fama e o génio do compositor não passaram despercebidos aos seus contemporâneos a nível internacional. Handel era justamente considerando um dos melhores compositores do mundo. Mas as reações eram as mais diversas.

Sir Isaac Newton acerca dos seus dotes como intérprete de instrumentos de tecla:

I found...nothing worthy to remark but the elasticity of his fingers.

O Dr. John Arbuthnot (matemático e físico seu contemporâneo) afirmava:

Conceive the highest you can of his abilities, and they are far beyond anything you can conceive.

O grande Johann Sebastian Bach:

Handel é a única pessoa no mundo que eu gostaria de conhecer antes de morrer, e a única pessoa que eu gostaria de ser, se não fosse Bach.

Acerca desta frase de Bach, Mozart comentou:

Na verdade eu faço minhas as suas palavras.

Jonathan Swift exclamou certa vez enquanto esperava em Dublin por uma visita de Handel:

O pray let me see a German genius before I die!

Depois de ouvir o coro “Hallelujah” do Messias, conta-se que o grande compositor Joseph Haydn chorava como uma criança, dizendo:

Ele é o mestre de todos nós.

Entre os seus maiores admiradores achava-se Beethoven:

Handel é o maior compositor que alguma vez viveu… Perante o seu túmulo eu tiraria o meu chapéu e pôr-me-ia de joelhos.

Sempre que lhe perguntavam quem era o maior compositor de sempre:

Handel! Perante ele eu ajoelho-me.

Outra vez Beethoven, ao consultar uma edição das obras de Handel:

Aqui está a verdade.

Alexander Pope:

Strong in new arms the giant Handel stands,
Like bold Briareus with a hundred hands.

Uma breve descrição física de Handel, por um seu contemporâneo:

[Handel] was large in person, and his natural corpulency, which increased as he advanced in age, rendered his whole appearance of that bulky porportion, as to give rise to Quin's inelegant, but forcible expression, that his hands were feet, and his fingers toes. From a sedentary life, he had contracted a stiffness in his joints,which in addition to his great weight and weakness of body, rendered his gait awkward; still his countenance was open, manly, and animated; expressive of all that grandeur and benevolence, which were the prominent features of his character. In temper he was irrascible, impatient of contradiction, but not vindictive; jealous of his musical pre-eminence, and tenacious in all points, which regarded his professional honour.
William Coxe, Anecdotes of G.F. Handel and J.C. Smith, (1799)

Uma das questões que divide os estudiosos da actualidade é a suposta homossexualidade do compositor. Fosse ou não gay, a verdade é que nunca casou, e são raras aos olhos dos seus contemporâneos as evidências de uma inclinação natural para com o sexo oposto, à excepção de dois casos que mais lembram meras situações contratuais que propriamente relações dominadas pelos afectos:

Handel contracted few intimacies, and when his early friends died, he was not solicitous of acquiring new ones. He was never married; but his celibacy must not be attributed to any deficiency of personal attractions...On the contrary, it was owing to the independence of his disposition, which feared degradation, and dreaded confinement. For when he was young, two of his scholars, ladies of considerable fortune, were so much enamored of him, that each was desirous of a matrimonial alliance. This first is said to have fallen a victim to her attachment. Handel would have married her; but his pride was stung by the coarse declaration of her mother, that she never would consent to the marriage of her daughter with a fiddler; and, indignant at the expression, he declined all further intercourse. After the death of the mother, the father renewed the acquaintance, and informed him that all obstacles were removed; but he replied, that the time was now past; and the young lady fell into decline, which soon terminated her existence. The second attachment, was a lady splendidly related, whose hand he might have obtained by renouncing his profession. That condition he resolutely refused, and laudably declined the connection which was to prove a restriction on the great faculties of his mind.
William Coxe, Anecdotes of G.F. Handel and J.C. Smith, (1799).

Companheiro de Handel, e por muitos anos da sua vida, foi o seu fiel criado, o qual após a morte do compositor foi por testamento feito um dos seus herdeiros.

I have heard it related, that when Handel's servant used to bring him his chocolate in the morning, he often stood silent with astonishment (until it was cold) to see his master's tears mixing with the ink as he penned his divine compositions; which are surely as much the pictures of a sublime mind as Milton's words.
William Shield, An Introduction to Harmony (1800)

Conta-se que antes das actuações Handel detestava ouvir os ruidos de afinação dos instrumentos da orquestra, por isso os músicos tinham o hábito de afinar os seus instrumentos muito antes do compositor chegar ao teatro (presumo que Covent Garden). Certa noite em que o Princípe de Gales estaria presente, um engraçadinho terá previemente desafinado todos os instrumentos da orquestra. Quando o Principe entrou na sala, Handel deu o sinal para que a orquestra começasse con spirito. Mas foi tal a chinfrineira que o compositor enraivecido levantou-se do seu lugar, e virando ao contrário com grande alarido um enorme contrabaixo que se encontrava no seu caminho, agarrou numa baquete de tambor e atirou-a com grande violência ao musico que dirigia a orquestra (nessa época, não havendo ainda a figura do maestro, era o concertino), saltando-lhe inclusivé a peruca da cabeça com o esforço. Sem sequer se compor avançou diante da orquestra, de cabeça descoberta, berrando por vingança, da tal maneira cego de raiva que mal conseguia articular as palavras, por entre as gargalhadas do público. O próprio Princípe de Gales arriscou aproximar-se do gigante enraivecido e com muita dificuldade lá lhe conseguiu acalmar a fúria. Apenas nesse momento Handel se voltou a sentar ao cravo e continuar a actuação.

Quando tocava:

Silence, the truest applause, succeeded, the instant that he addressed himself to the instrument; and that was so profound, that it checked respiration, and seemed to control the functions of nature.
Sir John Hawkins, A General History of the Science and Practice of Music (1776).

When jaundice jealousy, and carking care,
Or tyrant pride, or homicide despair,
The soul as on a rack in torture keep,
These monsters Handel's music lulls to sleep.
Anónimo, 1740 .

De novo, Sir Isaac Newton:

Upon my mentioning to [Sir Isaac Newton] the rehearsal of the Opera to night (Radamisto) he said he never was at more than one Opera. The first Act he heard with pleasure, the 2d stretch'd his patience, at the 3d he ran away.
Diário do Reverendo William Stukeley, 18t de Abril de 1720

George Bernard Shaw:

It was from Handel that I learned that style consists in force of assertion. If you can say a thing with stroke unanswerably you have style; if not, you are at best a marchand de plaisir, a decorative littérateur or a musical confectioner, or a painter of fans with cupids and cocottes. Handel has this power...You may despise what you like; but you cannot contradict Handel.

Handel is not a mere composer in England: he is an institution. What is more, he is a sacred institution.