MS music score and lyrics of pieces from Handel's Samson

Scope and Content

Most of the sheets are manuscript ink on paper, some are photocopies.

The music score and lyrics appear to be used for musicians accompanying an unidentified performance of Handel's Samson.

Pencil annotations throughout.

The collection of papers seems to be incomplete:

  • 3 sheets: 'Sequence of Numbers', gives numbers in the oratorio
  • Untitled bass score + 1 photocopy
  • Untitled treble score + 3 photocopies
  • Untitled treble and bass score with lyrics beginning 'Life lest fierce remembrance wake my sudden rage' + 2 photocopies
  • 'No. 6 Air: 'Loud as the thunder's awful voice': double-sided manuscript score + 6 single-sided photocopies (3 recto, 3 verso)
  • No. 18 Recit: 'O miserable change!', No. 19a Recit 'O ever failing trust', and No. 19b Air: God of our fathers. 2 sheets of MS score + 3 photocopies
  • No. 19b Air: 'God of our fathers' and No. 22 Recit: 'Worse yet remains' double-sided manuscript score + 4 singled-sided photocopies (2 recto, 2 verso)
  • No. 25 Recit: "There lies our hope" + 2 photocopies
  • Act II. No. 32 Recit: 'Despair not thus' double-sided MS score + 4 single-sided photocopies (2 recto, 2 verso)
  • No. 37 Recit: 'But who is this? That so bedeck'd and gay' double-sided MS score + 4 single-sided photocopies (2 recto, 2 verso)
  • No. 39 Recit: 'Did love constrain thee' + 2 photocopies
  • No. 42 Recit: 'Forgive what's done' + 2 photocopies
  • No. 52 Recit: 'She's gone! A serpent manifest' + 1 photocopy
  • Untitled. 3 lines of treble and bass score and lyrics beginning 'Go, not through your streets' + 1 photocopy

Access Information

Open. Appointment necessary E-mail: archives@rcs.ac.uk