Handel’s Scipione

Scipione is an opera about a man at the height of his power, and the choice not to use it.

Scipio Africanus has just conquered New Carthage. He holds the city and commands the army, and Berenice is among the captives. Scipio holds all the power in that moment, but he refuses to treat her as a prize of victory. Instead, he returns her to the man she loves. The decision at the heart of the opera is what does it cost to do the right thing when the wrong thing would be easy, and would go unchallenged.

Handel wrote the opera in just three weeks. He finished the score on 2 March 1726, and it was performed ten days later. He was working to a deadline because his star soprano arrived late in London, and he needed something to fill the gap. None of that urgency shows in the music. In 1733, the novelist Prévost, writing from London, described it as some of Handel’s finest work, in the same breath as Giulio Cesare and Rodelinda.

The march that opens the opera also took on a life of its own. It became the Grenadier Guards’ regimental march and has been played at state occasions ever since. Many people have heard it without knowing where it comes from.