| Happy birthday to George Friedrich Handel, seen here looking pierced and modern, who was born February 23, 1685. You’ve probably sat through his Messiah oratorio at least once (“Hallellujah! Hallellujah! Hallellujah! …” I’m sure you remember.)
I’ve always loved Handel’s kind of music, as well as this complete diss of it, penned in 1765: |
 |
the Pleasure Artists feel in hearing much of that compos’d in the modern Taste, is not the natural Pleasure arising from Melody or Harmony of Sounds, but of the same kind with the Pleasure we feel on seeing the surprizing Feats of Tumblers and Rope Dancers, who execute difficult Things… Many Pieces of it are mere Compositions of Tricks.
That (and much more) was the very scathing opinion of Benjamin Franklin.