Synopsis

On the popular NPR quiz show Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, there is a segment called “Bluff the Listener” where three outlandish news stories are read to a contestant, who then has to guess which one is true. So, for the voice of Bill Kurtis on your home answering machine, which of these really happened in London on today’s date in 1732:

a) George Frideric Handel got into a sword fight with his Southbank wigmaker, screaming at the poor man, “Donnervetter! In dis vig I luk like ein Pomeranian hund!”

b) Handel’s especially smooth trip across the Thames to buy said wig provided the inspiration for his famous Water Music, or

c) as part of his 47th birthday celebration, choir boys from the Chapel Royal sang and acted in a staged performance of Handel’s sacred oratorio Esther in the Crown and Anchor Tavern on the Strand.

If you guessed “C” you would be correct. Extra points if you knew that this would be the only staged performance of any of Handel sacred oratorios before the twentieth century, and that in Handel’s day there was a ban on presenting staged biblical dramas in public theaters — but not, apparently, in pubs.

Music Played in Today's Program

George Friedrich Handel (1835-1921): Overture from Esther (1732 version); London Handel Orchestra; Laurence Cummings, conductor; SOMM CD-2389