蜜芽传媒

French baroque music specialists Le Concert Spirituel celebrate Handel's music for royalty in a concert recorded live in the presence of His Majesty King Charles III at St James's Spanish Place, London.

A fanfare and a performance of the national anthem by baritone Roderick Williams precedes a range of Handelian royal repertoire - from the Coronation Anthems, composed for the coronation of George II in 1726, to the Te Deum celebrating George's victory over the French at the Battle of Dettingen in 1743.

Handel's great festal music is now so indelibly associated with great state occasions that it's easy to forget that the German composer only became a citizen of these isles quite late in life. A great favourite of George I, one of the king's last acts before his death in 1727 was to sign an "Act of naturalisation of George Frideric H盲ndel and others." So H盲ndel became Handel and responded with his first commission as a newly naturalised British subject by writing - at breakneck speed - the music for the coronation of George II of Great Britain and Queen Caroline.

This performance comes from the church of St James's Spanish Place, whose majestic neo-Gothic interior and soaring ceilings make it ideally suited for large-scale early music performances presented by its near neighbour, Wigmore Hall.

Presented by Ian Skelly

Handel: Dettingen Te Deum HWV283
Handel: The king shall rejoice HWV260
Handel: Let thy hand be strengthened HWV259
Handel: My heart is inditing HWV261
Handel: Zadok the priest HWV258

Le Concert Spirituel
Herv茅 Niquet, conductor