Handel’s music is crucial to the history of the trumpet due to its influential role in the Baroque era and its significant contributions to trumpet repertoire. George Frideric Handel, an 18th-century German-born composer, composed a wealth of music that prominently featured the trumpet. His compositions, including the “Water Music” and “Music for the Royal Fireworks,” showcased the trumpet’s majestic and virtuosic qualities.

Handel’s music pushed the trumpet’s technical boundaries, demanding skill and versatility from trumpeters. This contributed to the instrument’s evolution, inspiring subsequent composers and trumpet players. Handel’s works remain vital in the trumpet canon, highlighting its historical importance and ongoing relevance in the world of classical music.

There has been a significant rise in the number of trumpeters wishing to perform baroque music over the last decade, mainly as a result of the new piccolo trumpet which being more readily available has put this difficult music within the reach of the average player. This instrument overcomes some of the limitations found in ordinary trumpets such as accuracy in the upper register and enables trills and other ornaments essential to 17th and 18th-century music to be more reliably executed. A need therefore has arisen for more original works for solo trumpet to be provided and many old manuscripts in libraries and archives are now being published along with studies compiled from the collected editions of Bach, Handel, and Purcell. The present set of volumes is intended as a companion to the J.S. Bach Complete Trumpet Repertoire and has some of the same aims in mind; completeness is considered very important and all variants, new discoveries, and attributed works have been included. The music has been set out to be used as reliable performing material in addition to its study purpose and the player will find all rests, tact sections, da capo indications, and sufficient cues clearly marked. The trumpet parts have been given separate staves to avoid confusion where parts cross and the pitch has been left untransposed throughout conforming with 18th-century practice in England, France, and Italy.

There are four books, totaling nearly 300 pages, and include every trumpet part from Handel’s catalog in stacked-score style ready for solo or section practice as needed. Below you will find the full table of contents and to the left you can find samples from every volume. When you are ready click above for an immediate digital download, discounted at launch by 40% when you buy the complete set.

Table of Contents

Volume 1: The Operas

1. Almira
2. Agrippina
3. Rinaldo I
4. Teseo
5. Silla
6. Amadigi
7. Radamisto
8. Floridante
9. Muzio Scevola
10. Giulio Cesare
11. Alessandro
12. Riccardo
13. Lotario
14. Partenope
15. Poro
16. Rinaldo II
17. Ezio
18. Sosarme
19. Ariodante
20. Atalanta
21. Giustino
22. Serse (Xerxes)
23. Deidamia

Volume 2: Sacred Oratorios

1. La Resurrezione
2. Haman and Mordecai (Esther I)
3. Esther I
4. Deborah
5. Athalia
6. Saul
7. Israel in Egypt
8. Samson
9. The Messiah
10. Joseph
11. Belshazzar
12. The Occasional Oratorio
13. Judas Maccabaeus
14. Joshua
15. Alexander Balus
16. Susanna
17. Solomon
18. Theodora
19. Jephtha

Volume 3: Church Music

1. Utrecht Te Deum
2. Utrecht Jubilate
3. Anthem IVa ‘O sing unto the Lord’
4. ‘Caroline’ Te Deum
5. Te Deum in B flat
6. Coronation Anthems
7. ‘Zadok the Priest’
8. ‘The King shall rejoice’
9. ‘My heart is inditing’
10. Anthem ‘O praise the Lord’
11. Anthem ‘This is the Day’
12. Anthem ‘Sing unto God’
13. Dettingen Anthem
14. Dettingen Te Deum
15. Foundling Hospital Anthem
16. Urio Te Deum (Handel)

Volume 4: Incidental Music

1. Aci Galatea e Polifemo
2. Il Trionfo del Tempo
3. Cantata ‘O! come chiare e belle’
4. Birthday Ode (Queen Anne)
5. Water Music
6. Acis and Galatea
7. Suite in D for trumpet
8. Il Parnasso in Festa
9. Alexander’s Feast
10. Ode for St. Cecilia’s Day
11. L’Allegro ed il Pensieroso
12. Semele
13. Hercules
14. Concerto in D (2 trpt. 4 hn.)
15. Fireworks Music
16. Alceste
17. The Choice of Hercules
18. The Triumph of Time and Truth
19. March in D (Sinfonie Diverse)
20. Suite in D for trumpet (Paderborn)