Learning Handels Hallelujah Chorus

Motivation

This blog post pulls together my experiences and progress while playing Handels Messiah. I am not a keyboard or an organ pro, my interpretation may vary from what you know.

Messiah (Handel) is a popular piece used to herald a notable event. I hear it most often during the Christmas period, or at times during Choir performances. I play the organ in my choir, so I knew it was definitely something I must learn sooner or later. My view of Handels Messiah when growing was a very ambugious piece like that meant for the pros. I am not a pro now, but well… I’ll still try my best. Its just less than 5 months before Christmas, lets see if I can learn it before then.

Introduction: m. 1 - m. 21

In as much as I know this piece is what I would love to learn, I am not that pressurized to learn in a haste. I am just taking my time to practice when I can. At times once a week, or twice, or more.
And maximum I’ve practiced a day is an hour, I am also learning the Violin; maintaining balance is good too.

This classical piece I am working with has 94 measures, 5 pages in total. And apparently, it took me two weeks to learn page 1. If one is to do mental maths, we should hope in 10 weeks I should be done, considering my learning curve :)

My inability to move my fingers fast while reading sheet music is affecting me very much. My sight reading and muscle memory is not worth talking about, but I’m trying. I had issues in measures 5,6,.. and others due to the fast movement of the fingers. So at times, I’m not sure I am exactly getting the complete notes, but I think 91% of what I play is correct

Measure 22

I think measure 22 would occupy an entire div to itself. So far, its the only measure that I spent almost two or more of my learning days. My timing was off, getting the tempo and all kept throwing me off balance. I listened to it being played on and on, but still couldn’t get it. I played only my left hand to the point of memorization, but still I couldn’t merge both together.

Finally, I was able to get it right. My timing is not yet perfect, but with constant practice, I would be able to run through measures 22 - 25 at a go.