The Taverner Choir & Players, Andrew Parrott - Handel: Messiah (1989)

For this new period-instrument Messiah, Andrew Parrott has wisely chosen to model his performance on those given by Handel, at the Foundling Hospital, in his last years. For the majority of Messiah performances one hears today, the choir is about twice the size of the orchestra, in Handel's own performances the orchestra was marginally larger than the choir. It seems that the 1758 performance, the last Handel directed at the hospital, was the model here as far as the orchestra is concerned (the booklet gives the date as 1754, but the orchestra was then rather larger): here we have strings 6.6.3.3.2, with four each of oboes and bassoons, along with trumpets and horns (these last used by Handel although he wrote no specific parts for them) and timpani. Parrott's choir is 8.5.4.5, marginally larger than Handel's; but it would be foolish to be purist about this, particularly as Handel used only boys and men while Parrott has sopranos and mixed altos.
Parrott's performance is in many respects quite traditional, even, to my surprise, to the extent of having the repeat of the first part of the Overture done piano with reduced forces, an effect that always seems to me rather romantic. There are no departures from the usual text, and no revolutionary tempos; and in fact the conservative, old-fashioned Handelian will be perfectly at ease with this set, except as regards the weight of choral tone. But the slimmed down choir has many rewards to offer. In the semiquaver passages in such choruses as ''And he shall purify'' or ''For unto us a child is born'', there is a clarity, precision and evenness that would be the envy of anyone directing a larger choir. The choruses early in Part 2 are quite outstanding, too: a powerful ''Surely He hath borne our griefs'', and a really magnificently vigorous ''He trusted in God'' delivered with enormous punch. I doubt whether Handel ever heard anything quite like that. ''Lift up your heads'' has a fine vitality of rhythm, and the testing ''Let us break their bonds'' is impeccably clean. Yet the choruses do not often have that visionary quality, that excitement, that belongs to this extraordinarily inspired and inspiring music. Some seem even a shade laboured, and ''Hallelujah'' wants something of sheer exuberance. Parrott uses the horns here, doubling the famous trumpet solo an octave lower, the ring of the lone trumpet has always seemed to me particularly thrilling, but perhaps that wasn't what Handel intended.
The solo team here compares pretty well with those on the rival recordings. All the versions listed above have quite outstanding sopranos: Emma Kirkby on the Hogwood (L'Oiseau-Lyre), Lynne Dawson on the Christophers (Hyperion), Arleen Auger on the Pinnock (Archiv Production). Here it is Emma Kirkby, again, sharing with Emily Van Evera (Handel usually had two sopranos). Kirkby does a spirited ''Rejoice greatly'', a wonderfully shapely ''How beautiful are the feet'' and an ''I know that my redeemer liveth'' with some truly exquisite sound and subtle timing, but also to my taste slightly more ornamentation than this piece can happily accommodate notably at the final cadence, where the profoundly expressive leap to a leading note is sacrificed. I cannot be quite so enthusiastic over Emily Van Evera who sounds strained in the recitatives preceding ''Glory to God'' and thinnish and edgy in the soprano solos early in Part 2. Margaret Cable is a finely even, disciplined singer, always a pleasure to listen to, and gives an assured, controlled account of ''He was despised'', at quite a slow tempo, she does not raise the emotional pulse, though.
James Bowman's contribution is a shade uneven but he is at his best in ''But who may abide''; I enjoyed ''Thou art gone up on high'' much less. He and Joseph Cornwell, the tenor, join effectively in ''O death, where is thy sting''; Cornwell gives a clear and graceful account of the opening numbers and is specially impressive in ''All they that see him''. As always, David Thomas turns in a strong and musical series of performances, with some truly noble singing in ''The people that walked''. It seems a pity, with so fiery a bass to hand, to give only the short version of ''Why do the nations''; maybe that is what Handel did in the performance on which this is modelled, but if he had had Thomas in his team he would have done the full one, or even written a newly extended version. In ''The trumpet shall sound'', Thomas sings the original setting, with Handel's misaccentuation (''incorruptible'', for example).