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The British Museum, which opened in 1759, was the first publicly owned, free-entrance museum in Europe. Visiting it widened the horizons of ordinary folk, enabling them to learn about the lives of people and societies from beyond their own time and place.
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The German baroque composers George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) and J C Bach (1732-95) settled in England, where there was more money and freedom than in other European countries. The classical composers, Haydn and Mozart, both did concert tours in England. Haydn, who had spent most of his life as composer to the Hungarian Esterházy court, said: 'How sweet is some degree of liberty!'
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Handel, a favourite of both George I and George II, was a supporter of the era's fashionable charities. In 1750 and 1751, 1,000 people attended benefit performances of his Messiah to raise money for the Foundling Hospital. But while Handel supported good works, he did not challenge the system that left so many people poor and powerless. In contrast, Mozart, particularly in his operas Don Giovanni and The Marriage of Figaro, ridiculed the aristocracy and challenged their right to wield power.
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