Partisans of the one-voice-per-part approach don't like to talk about it, but many early performances of Haydn's oratorios, and of the Handel performances in England that inspired him, included hundreds of musicians. They could be performed by smaller groups, but clearly when Haydn wanted all cylinders firing, this is what he had in mind. Historical performances that observe this precedent for The Creation exist, but this seems to be the first such performance of Haydn's second oratorio, The Seasons. Conductor Paul McCreesh ...
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Partisans of the one-voice-per-part approach don't like to talk about it, but many early performances of Haydn's oratorios, and of the Handel performances in England that inspired him, included hundreds of musicians. They could be performed by smaller groups, but clearly when Haydn wanted all cylinders firing, this is what he had in mind. Historical performances that observe this precedent for The Creation exist, but this seems to be the first such performance of Haydn's second oratorio, The Seasons. Conductor Paul McCreesh, leading a massed group encompassing the Poland's National Forum of Music Choir, the Wroclaw Baroque Orchestra, and the Gabrieli Consort & Players, makes other tweaks as well. He has re-edited the text: billed as a new translation, it's actually a smoothing-out of Baron Gottfried van Swieten's English rendering of his own German translation of James Thomson's English original. This is justified: Haydn wanted the work to be heard in both languages, and van Swieten's English version...
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