Handel Prize

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The Handel Prize (officially: Handel Prize of the City of Halle, awarded by the Handel House Foundation ) is a music prize awarded in 1959 as the Handel Prize of the Halle district . It has been awarded since 2009 in coordination with the Handel House and the City of Halle (Saale) on the occasion of the annual Handel Festival . After a two-year break, from 1993 to 2008 it traded as the Handel Prize of the City of Halle . Among the award winners were leading cultural workers in Central Germany in the GDR . After "internationalization" and an increase in prize money to 10,000 euros, the prize is now awarded as an honorary prize.

history

The Handel Prize of the Halle District (also: Handel Prize of the Council of the Halle District ) was awarded for the first time in 1959. Musicians, singers and composers were among the winners. In addition, directors and musicologists, sculptors and painters as well as writers were honored. Music organizers and cultural politicians were also honored. Finally, the award was also given to choirs / music groups and other artistically working collectives . In addition to Central German personalities, some Western artists and musicologists were also honored.

The prize was endowed with a cash award. The winners received a bronze medal with a diameter of 10 cm. The medal was designed in 1959 by the sculptor Gerhard Lichtenfeld from the Halle - Burg Giebichenstein University of Applied Sciences . On the front was the Handel profile with an allonge wig and the signatures "G · Friedrich Handel" and "G · L". On the back one found the inscription "Handel price of the council of the district of Halle".

After a two-year break, the Handel Prize of the City of Halle was awarded from 1993 . It was endowed with 20,000 Deutschmarks. Only one winner was awarded each year. The recipients of the award, some of them international, were now without exception artists and musicologists.

The future jewelry designer Silke Plathe created a 4 × 3.5 cm pin made of gold and enamel for the Handel Prize 1994 ff . On the front is a crossed bar from the autograph of the Handel oratorio Messiah ( HWV 56, German: The Messias ), first part, 5th Accompagnato (bass): Thus saith the Lord (German: “So speaks der Herr”) and to see the coat of arms of the city of Halle. The number “900” is on the back.

In 2008, the prize was entrusted to the Handel House Foundation, with the advisory board having the right to make proposals and the board of trustees taking the decision. The award itself is presented by the mayor of the city of Halle as an honorary award ; since 2011 it has been called the Handel Prize of the city of Halle, awarded by the Handel House Foundation . The statutes state that the Handel Prize is awarded to “Individuals and ensembles for outstanding artistic, scientific or cultural-political achievements, insofar as these are related to the care of Handel”.

Award winners

Handel Prize of the Halle District (1959–1990)

Handel Prize of the City of Halle (1993–2008)

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, the Handel Prize was not awarded for two years.

Handel Prize of the City of Halle (since 2009)

(awarded by the Handel House Foundation)

literature

  • Christoph Rink: Chronology of the Handel Prize . In: Announcements of the Friends and Sponsors of the Handel House in Halle eV 1/2012, pp. 20-25.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Handel Festival opens in Halle. In: Neue Zeit , June 7, 1993, vol. 49, issue 129, p. 13.
  2. ↑ Christoph Rink: Chronology of the Handel price. In: Announcements of the Friends and Sponsors of the Handel House in Halle eV 1/2012, pp. 20-25.