I imagine a dinner party with blind Milton, fat Handel and wicked Morris as a riotous and highly disputatious evening ending in sworn blood-brotherhood. Story is there none: more a stream of arias by ...

Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. During the Great Frost of 1740, while the Thames froze, Handel was not idle. As though to shut the winter out ...

Handel composed “L’Allego, il Penseroso ed il Moderato” and it was first performed in 1740. At the suggestion of Handel’s librettist Charles Jennens, Milton’s two poems, “L’Allegro” and “il Penseroso, ...

Last night’s concert had the appeal of being both a major work and one decidedly neglected in contemporary performance. Handel’s L’Allegro, Il Penseroso ed il Moderato is an oratorio that sits kicking ...