Tuesday 31 August 2010
Tune of the Day: Slow March
from Handel's “Scipione”, arranged for Flute duet
This march is taken from the opera Scipione, composed in 1725 by George Frideric Handel. The opera's hero, Scipio, is a Roman centurion who has recently conquered New Carthage. He is in love with the captive Berenice but magnanimously releases her to her beloved Allucius, an Iberian Prince.
After Handel's death his operas fell into obscurity and only since the 1960s have they been rediscovered in the opera house. The famous march from Scipio has however remained popular since its first performance and has been the Regimental Slow March of the British Grenadier Guards since the 18th century.