Handel by Handel- The Man & His Music (retail) (epub)

Author:Handel- The Man & His Music (retail) (epub)
Format: epub
Publisher: Random House
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

During her previous London season she had had to combat the coarseness of the footmen’s gallery and the malice of her female audience, who found her conceited and affecting ‘la milady’, but by sheer tenacity she had established herself as a creative dancer of the first rank, laying on for Rich the sort of spectacle the rigidly conservative Paris Opéra had hitherto scorned. If there was any notoriety, it came not from her conduct (she refused, according to Prévost, to part with her virtue for 2,000 guineas) but from the daring muslin draperies she wore ‘sur le modèle d’une statue grecque’ in her ballet Pigmalion. Her 1733 benefit, to a packed house, remained fresh in the memory of the seventeen-year-old David Garrick, who told the great dancer Noverre years afterwards of latecomers hammering on the theatre doors: if it went on like this, thought Prévost, she would need a lot more than 2,000 guineas.

As a prelude to the revised Pastor Fido with which Handel’s company opened at Covent Garden on 9 November 1734, he prepared a divertissement for Sallé based on one of her previous successes, Colin de Blamont’s Caractères d’amour and entitled Terpsichore. The piece was also designed to mark the arrival of the new company. Apollo, sung by Carestini, arrives from Parnassus to discover whether his new ‘Academy’ (Covent Garden) is worthy of him, and asks Erato (Strada) what has become of Terpsichore. On she bounces, to perform various dances illustrative of passions described by the singers. So that the audience could have their fill of la ravissante Sallé Handel interpolated ballet numbers into Il Pastor Fido itself and into all that season’s subsequent operas, as part of his contract with Rich. The Opera of the Nobility had done its best to lure the dancer to the King’s Theatre by doubling Covent Garden’s offer, but Sallé could afford to be honourable. ‘What about my word? Does that count for nothing?’ was her response to Heidegger, and she stayed loyal to Rich and Handel for the coming season.

With a star ballerina and a spanking new theatre, this might have been enough to draw the crowds. Covent Garden nevertheless needed to take its competitors seriously, especially when they could afford a star like Farinelli. ‘Till I had heard him,’ wrote Paolo Rolli to Giuseppe Riva, ‘I had heard only a small part of what human song can achieve, whereas I now conceive that I have heard all there is to hear.’ The vogue for the stellar eunuch gripped fashionable London no less powerfully than the Cuzzoni–Faustina rivalry some years previously. Handel and Rich were undaunted, with two new operas ready for the coming season, beginning on 9 November 1734. The first of these, Ariodante, was held over until 8 January, by which time Sallé had made her mark on the audience. The new company of singers had established itself in an Arianna revival, followed by Oreste, a pasticcio from earlier Handel stage works.

When finally presented, Ariodante enjoyed a modest run of eleven performances, with the customary revival the following year.

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