Handel and Halle

He was baptized not at the cathedral where he would later hold a post, but at the Marktkirche on the Marktplatz — on 24 February 1685, the day after his birth. His musical training also began in that church: his teacher was the church's organist, Zachow, and he learned on the small organ built by Reichel in 1664, on the east side of the nave. More than three hundred years later, that original instrument is still there.

On 13 March 1702, the seventeen-year-old Handel was appointed organist of Halle Cathedral. The cathedral at the time served a Reformed (Calvinist) congregation; a Lutheran youth playing the organ in a Calvinist church was, in itself, a small footnote to Halle's breadth of spirit. The following year he left for Hamburg. Halle did not keep Handel, but it never lost him either.

Messiah later carried Halle's name around the world; Halle, in turn, kept Handel at the very center of the city. His bronze statue stands in the Marktplatz, between the twin towers of the Marktkirche; the Handel Festival, first held in 1922, has run every year since 1952, with Messiah a regular feature.

The Europe Carillon, completed on the Red Tower in 1999, has 76 bronze bells and is said to be the largest in Europe; the melody it rings on the hour comes from the Messiah aria “I know that my Redeemer liveth” — every day, the heart of this city proclaims the resurrection in bells. The one we worship is that same risen Lord.