It is true that these works are not in Handel's usual
manner; they are more difficult and more in the style of Bach. I am
glad that Handel gave us these two examples of a slightly (for it is
not much) varied manner and I am interested to observe that he did
not adhere to that manner in Jephtha, but I should be sorry to convey
an impression that I think Theodora and Susanna are in any way
unworthy of Handel. I prefer both to Judas Maccabaeus which, in
spite of the many fine things it contains, I like perhaps the least
of all his oratorios. I have played Theodora and Susanna all
through, and most parts (except the recitatives) many times over,
Jones and I have gone through them again and again; I have heard
Susanna performed once, and Theodora twice, and I find no single
piece in either work which I do not admire, while many are as good as
anything which it is in my power to conceive. I like the chorus "He
saw the lovely youth" the least of anything in Theodora so far as I
remember at this moment, but knowing it to have been a favourite with
Handel himself I am sure that I must have missed understanding it.
How comes it, I wonder, that the chorale-like air "Blessing, Honour,
Adoration" is omitted in Novello's edition? It is given in Clarke's
edition and is very beautiful.
Jones says of "With darkness deep", that in the accompaniment to this
air the monotony of dazed grief is just varied now and again with a
little writhing passage.
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