The majority of Handel’s Italian cantatas were composed between 1707 and 1710 during his productive apprenticeship in Italy.  They were probably influenced by Alessandro Scarlatti and are of simple construction: a few da capo arias each preceded by a recitative and often on the theme of Love in an idyllic pastoral grove.  In a number of these Handel reached the heights of dramatic expressiveness; they are musically equal to the greatest of Bach’s cantatas even though the subject matter and emotional content are highly different.  In Rome, where public opera was forbidden, the form flourished and many works grew to mini-operatic proportions: Apollo and Dafne, Handel’s most ambitious cantata, is effectively a one-act operatic masterpiece.

The story is from Ovid’s Metamorphoses and conforms to the typical pastoral setting. The god Apollo revels in the glory of freeing Greece from the terror and devastation wrought by a monstrous Python. With typical bravado, Apollo boasts in two bellicose arias of his conquering arm and his mighty bow and arrow that are a match even to Cupid.  Apollo soon sets eyes on Dafne and falls in love, perhaps thanks to a revengefully playful cupid, but Dafne is committed to a life of freedom and is faithful only to Diana (or Cynthia), the maiden goddess.  With a succession of varied arias interspersed with brief secco recitatives, Handel builds the tension of Apollo’s misguided and increasingly desperate attempts at seduction and Dafne’s constant and firm rebuttal of it.  Eventually Dafne’s only escape from Apollo’s approaches is to beg Diana to be transformed into a laurel tree.

The musical language of the cantata is sometimes very bold, both in declamation and harmony: an incomparably beautiful piece of scene-painting occurs in Dafne’s first aria when the nymph, singing of her commitment to Diana, to freedom and to the groves (‘Happy she, whose soul contented’), is accompanied by pizzicato strings and a solo flute, whilst her anger and unease comes through in the restless momentum of her second aria (‘Vain protesting’).  The final chase and its abrupt conclusion are brilliantly demonstrated by the frenetic concerto grosso movement that comes to a shuddering halt in the middle of a phrase as Apollo gives up the chase, whilst the extraordinary pathos of Apollo’s final aria (‘Fairest laurel’) brings the cantata to a reflective close.