The Water Music (German: Wassermusik) is a collection of orchestral movements, often published as three suites, composed by George Frideric Handel.

This sequence derives from Samuel Arnold's first edition of the complete score in 1788 and the manuscript copies dating from Handel's lifetime.

Chrysander's edition also contains an earlier version of the first two movements of HWV 349 in the key of F major composed in 1715 (originally scored for two natural horns, two oboes, bassoon, strings, and continuo), where in addition to the horn fanfares and orchestral responses, the original version contained an elaborate concerto-like first violin part.

At about 8 p.m. on Wednesday, 17 July 1717, King George I and several aristocrats boarded a royal barge at Whitehall Palace, for an excursion up the Thames toward Chelsea.

The king was so pleased with Water Music that he ordered it to be repeated at least three times, both on the trip upstream to Chelsea and on the return, until he landed again at Whitehall.

[3] It was rumoured that the Water Music was composed to help King George refocus London's attention from his son and heir (later George II of Great Britain), who, worried that his time to rule would be shortened by his father's long life, threw lavish parties and dinners to compensate for it; the Water Music's first performance on the Thames was the King's way of reminding London that he was still there and showing he could carry out gestures even grander than his son's.

According to the conductor Sir Thomas Beecham: The original Handelian orchestra was composed of a handful of strings and about a dozen reed wind instruments, mainly oboes and bassoons, with an occasional reinforcement of horns, trumpets, and drums, restricted by necessity to the somewhat monotonous repetition of tonic and dominant.

Another version has it that the Elector of Hanover approved of Handel's permanent move to London, knowing the separation between them would be temporary.

[9] Captain Peter Pulcer of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald from 1966 to 1971 was noted for playing this tune over the ship's public address system as it passed through locks in the Great Lakes and connecting canals.