Sunday music spot: the choir of King's College, Cambridge sing the "Hallelujah Chorus"



If you look carefully you can see that the audience in the chapel at King's College Cambridge are standing for this performance of the "Hallelujah Chorus" from Handel's Messiah.

The usual explanation for the tradition of standing for live performances of this chorus is that when the Messiah was first performed in 1743 King George II stood up at the opening bars of the Hallelujah Chorus and, of course, the audience followed suit. (In most circumstances it's very bad form to sit when the monarch is standing.)

Whether the King was impressed with the music as everyone likes to assume, needed to stretch his legs, or whether the whole story is a myth, we don't know. But we do know that there is a tradition of standing for this chorus which goes back a long way, and such a magnificent piece deserves it.

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