Handel’s Messiah: The Creative Process

This book seeks to redress this imbalance by providing a thorough investigation of the work’s creative process. Beginning with the creation of the libretto, it examines the earliest sketches, Handel’s use of pre-existent material, alterations made to the autograph score, and the latest versions of movements.

Amanda Babington is a lecturer at the Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester, England, and executive officer for the Royal Musical Association. She has published several articles on Handel, and her edition for the Hallische Händel-Ausgabe of Handel’s Dettingen Te Deum and Dettingen Anthem was published by Bärenreiter in 2016. She is regularly invited to give talks at Göttingen International Handel Festival. Dr Babington is also a musette player, baroque violinist, and recorder player, specialising in historically informed performance. As the artistic director of Baroque In The North, she has played and recorded with many of the leading British and European period-instrument ensembles. Her debut musette album, Music for French Kings, was well-received on its release in 2022, and featured on BBC Radio 3’s Early Music Show. She is also director of the University of Manchester Baroque Orchestra and has given masterclasses at various universities and conservatoires in the United Kingdom, and at the Jāzeps Vītols Latvian Academy of Music in Riga, Latvia.