Today, September 23, 2021, in class we talked about Handel’s Messiah and some of his works and how they relate to each other. Handel’s Messiah is an oratorio without the character and is considered one of Handel’s greatest works. At first when beginning to listen to it you realize that it is two hours long and at first I was amazed especially after looking at the libretto for the piece you think how does this take two hours to perform. Although when listening to the piece at first going into it I assumed I wouldn’t really like the music and enjoy it although just playing it in the background while doing other things I found it not so bad and enjoyed listening to the music as it can be almost peaceful to listen to during certain parts of the piece. It is very interesting to look at the verses of the Bible that Handel used to create this piece of music and how we have verses from the old testament and the new testament all used together in the creation of this piece. We also looked at a scene from “The Crown” in which the Queen of England is coronated and it plays Handel’s Zadok the Priest. Then we related that to Handel’s Messiah in that they both have similar parts and really Handel’s Messiah is just a coronation piece for Jesus. I really enjoyed when looking at the music and notes and how it related to the words sung so well, such when singing “every valley shall be exalted, the notes go up and create that image of something being exalted. Another example for the “like sheep we have gone astray” the notes wandered around once again creating that image. Once you start to break down the piece it becomes more and more interesting the deeper you dig and just the little details that Handel included in the creation of the music makes it that much better in the end.