Five Reasons to Hear “Messiah” this Easter

To modern audiences, the “Hallelujah” chorus and Christmas may be inextricably linked, but Handel’s emotionally poignant oratorio has much to offer us in the springtime. 

As surely as palm fronds herald Palm Sunday, Trinity Church’s annual performance of George Frideric Handel’s Messiah has come to represent the arrival of Christmastime — an event so beloved that tickets sell out within days and livestream viewers tune in from as far away as Australia. But on April 15 and 16 at 7pm, audience members can step into a sanctuary bedecked with spring blooms and branches to hear Trinity Baroque Orchestra and Trinity Choir perform Parts II and III of Handel’s oratorio — including the spectacular “Hallelujah” chorus. Why is the church bringing this classic to life in springtime? Our favorite musicians explain:

When Trinity’s choir first presented Messiah in its entirety in 1867, they too performed it around Easter.

And with good reason! While the story of Jesus’s birth is in Part I, which is a prophecy of things to come, at its heart, Messiah is a Passion narrative. Part II is the true substance of the oratorio, taking us on the journey of Jesus’s suffering and sacrifice. In fact, Handel’s librettist, Charles Jennens, chose the scriptures he did for Passion Week — the period from Palm Sunday [the day of Jesus’s entry into Jerusalem] to Good Friday [the day of his trial, crucifixion, and burial] — and Handel premiered the great oratorio in a music hall in Dublin on April 13, 1742. Part II ends with the great “Hallelujah” chorus, which is so climactic that many people leave once they’ve heard it. That’s unfortunate, because in Part III Handel paints a musical vision of the Kingdom of Heaven — some of the most sublime music ever created! Be sure to listen for “Worthy Is the Lamb That Was Slain,” “Blessing and Honour,” and the “Amen” chorus. — Fred Fehleisen, professor of music history at The Juilliard School 

This performance will definitely hold your attention.

The full work contains 53 songs! The second half — celebrating themes of hope, renewal, and resurrection — has always felt to me like the emotional center, and this scheduling allows us to bring audiences the most beautiful music upfront. The choruses and instrumental writing in these sections are so dramatic and expressive; it’s where the musicians reveal their full range of color, depth, and sound. One of my favorite parts is the end Passion sequence for solo tenor, “Thy rebuke hath broken his heart … Behold and see … he was cut off … But thou didst not leave his soul in hell.” There is a simplicity to it that juxtaposes the big arias and choruses, and the musical texture allows the libretto to shine through.  — Melissa Attebury, director of music, Trinity Church 

Handel is even more clever than you think.

I have called him the “master of musical irony,” because he had a great wit and a dramatic ability to juxtapose text and music. This is on full display in Part II. As we continue our descent toward the moment of Jesus’s death, Handel throws us off course with: “All we, like sheep, have gone astray … We have turned, every one, to his own way.” This delightful, frolicking piece is based on an Italian duet and seems almost out of place here. It’s literally foot-tapping music, and many listeners will find themselves doing just that! The thing is that there is more text to come, and Handel has cleverly led us astray. Musically, he has turned us into sheep! — Fehleisen

The Messiah is actually a little subversive. 

Staging anything that was religious in nature in a music hall was a bold move in the 18th century, and there was debate back then about whether the oratorio was sacrilegious. The Anglican Church had strict rules about separating worship and entertainment, and for quite a long time no one had performed anything having to do with Jesus in the theater; sacred material was kept to church services. But Handel, who wasn’t a church composer but was deeply religious and used his compositions to glorify God, ingeniously skirted the issue. Importantly, Jesus never appears — that would have been absolute heresy. Instead, he’s portrayed indirectly through prophecy, narration, and reflection. Still, even using New Testament scripture, especially Jesus’s words, was risky. So when Handel does use them — which he does only twice — he puts the phrases into the third person. For instance, he carefully rephrases Jesus’s words from Matthew 11:30, “My yoke is easy and my burden is light” to, “His yoke is easy, and his burden is light.” The approach allowed Handel to create a profound meditation on Jesus while respecting the religious and theatrical conventions of his time. — Fehleisen

It’s not every day you get the chance to hear one of the arias performed in Spanish. 

The idea grew out of a recording I made last fall of El Mesías, a Spanish translation of Messiah crafted by Mexican conductor and poet Mario Montenegro that he felt added to the universality of this already universal work of art. And for the tens of millions of Spanish-speaking Christians across the Americas and beyond, hearing these words in their language transforms the experience into something more personal. For me, being allowed to offer the aria in Spanish at Trinity is a profound gesture — an invitation to hear a beloved work through the beauty and color of another living language. The aria I will be singing is, “Thou Art Gone Up On High,” which opens the fifth scene of Part II and draws from Psalm 68:18, which the New Testament interprets as a prophecy of Christ’s ascension. Montenegro’s translation preserves the original libretto, but uses beautiful found Spanish renderings. “Asciendes a lo alto,” captures the triumphant movement of the ascension, while the closing phrase, “para que Dios esté con ellos,” lands with the same intimate promise as the original, “that the Lord might dwell among them.” This is one more way our music community at Trinity can offer comfort and healing in liturgy and on the concert stage alike. — Enrico Lagasca, bass soloist, Trinity Choir
 

Join us April 15–16 for Trinity's presentation of Messiah (Parts II and III). Get tickets to the performance at Trinity Church or visit our YouTube channel on April 16 at 7pm for the livestream.

Watch Messiah (Part I), performed by Trinity Choir and Trinity Baroque Orchestra on December 12, 2025.