Hector Berlioz
Berlioz, the passionate, ardent, irrepressible genius of French Romanticism, left a rich and original oeuvre which exerted a profound influence on 19th century music. Berlioz developed a profound affinity toward music and literature as a child. Sent to Paris at 17 to study medicine, he was enchanted by Gluck's operas, firmly deciding to become a composer. With his father's reluctant consent, Berlioz entered the Paris Conservatoire in 1826. His originality was already apparent and disconcerting -- a competition cantata, Cléopâtre (1829), looms as his first sustained masterpiece -- and he won the Prix de Rome in 1830 amid the turmoil of the July Revolution. Meanwhile, a performance of Hamlet in September 1827, with Harriet Smithson as Ophelia, provoked an overwhelming but unrequited passion, whose aftermath may be heard in the Symphonie fantastique (1830).
Returning from Rome, Berlioz organized a concert in 1832, featuring his symphony. Harriet Smithson was in the audience. They were introduced days later and married on October 3, 1833.
Berlioz settled into a career pattern which he maintained for more than a decade, writing reviews, organizing concerts, and composing a series of visionary masterpieces: Harold en Italie (1834), the monumental Requiem (1837), and an opera, Benvenuto Cellini (1838), a crushing fiasco. At year's end, the dying Paganini made Berlioz a gift of 20,000 francs, enabling him to devote nearly a year to the composition of his "dramatic symphony," Roméo et Juliette (1839). And then, to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the July Revolution, came the Symphonie funèbre et triomphale (1840).
Iridescently scored, an exquisite collection of six Gautier settings, Les nuits d'été, opened the new decade. This was a difficult time for Berlioz, as his marriage failed to bring him the happiness he desired. Concert tours to Brussels, many German cities, Vienna, Pesth, Prague, and London occupied him through most of the 1840s. He composed La Damnation de Faust, en route, offering the new work to a half-empty house in Paris, December 6, 1846. Expenses were catastrophic, and only a successful concert tour to St. Petersburg saved him.
He sat out the revolutionary upheavals of 1848 in London, returning to Paris in July. The massive Te Deum -- a "little brother" to the Requiem -- was largely composed over 1849, though it would not be heard until 1855. L'Enfance du Christ, scored an immediate and enduring success from its first performance on December 10, 1854. Elected to the Institut de France in 1855, he started receiving a members' stipend, and this provided him with a modicum of financial security. Consequently, Berlioz was able to devote himself to the summa of his career, his vast opera, Les Troyens, based on Virgil's Aeneid, the Roman poet's unfinished epic masterpiece. The opera was completed in 1858. As he negotiated for its performance, he composed a comique adaptation of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing, which met with a rapturous Baden première, on August 9, 1862. Unfortunately, only the third, fourth, and fifth acts of Les Troyens were mounted by the Théatre-Lyrique, a successful premiere, on November 4, 1863, and a run of 21 performances notwithstanding. This lopsided production stemmed from a compromise (bitterly regretted by the composer) that Berlioz had made with the Théâtre-Lyrique.
Though frail and ailing, Berlioz conducted his works in Vienna and Cologne in 1866, traveling to St. Petersburg and Moscow in the winter of 1867-1868. Despondent and tortured by self-doubt, the composer received a triumphant welcome in Russia. Back in Paris in March 1868, he was but a walking shadow as paralysis slowly overcame him.
© Adrian Corleonis /TiVo
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Symphonie Fantastique
Classical - Released by Il Loggione Records on 29 Nov 2018
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berlioz - Symphonie Fantastique
Beograd Philharmonic Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Bamberg Symphonic Orchestra
Classical - Released by Piros Comercial Digital on 12 Mar 2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berlioz : Benvenuto Cellini, Op. 23 : Ouverture
Berlioz, Hector, Hector [Composer]
Pop - Released by SeaForam Records on 23 Oct 2016
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Rediscovering French Artists in 21 Volumes - Vol. 1/21 : La Damnation de Faust
Opera - Released by ISIS Sarl on 3 Nov 2016
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Francia en la Música Clásica - Berlioz
Orquesta Sinfónica de Slovaquia
Classical - Released by Piros Juan's Digital on 25 Mar 2001
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berlioz: Symphony Fantastique in C Major, Op. 14 (Digitally Remastered)
Leningrad Philharmonic Orchestra
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on 10 Apr 2013
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Berlioz: The Secret Judge Overture, Op. 3 (Digitally Remastered)
Orchestra of the Moscow Philharmonic
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on 10 Apr 2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berlioz: Symphony Fantastique in C Major, Op. 14 (Digitally Remastered)
Classical - Released by EMG Classical on 10 Apr 2013
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berlioz: Harold en Italie - Massenet: Scenes Pittoresques
Radio Symphony Orchestra Bratislava, Philharmonia Slavonica, Milan Telecky
Classical - Released by Blaricum CD Company (B.C.D.) B.V. on 20 May 2014
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
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Hector Berlioz
Symphonieorchester Des Bayerischen Rundfunks
Classical - Released by Piros Comercial Digital on 14 Feb 2015
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Berlioz - Symphony Fantastique, Op. 14
The Hague Philharmonic Orchestra, Willem van Otterloo
Classical - Released by West Oak Records on 5 Mar 2012
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Berlioz - Harold in Italy
Sinfonieorchester Des Südwestfunks, Ulrich Koch
Classical - Released by ClassicalPirosDigital on 13 Jul 2015
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Dioses de la Música - Berlioz, Schubert
Philharmonie Südwest-Deutschland, Sylvia Capova
Classical - Released by Piros Comercial Digital on 24 May 2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Brahms, Weber, J Strauss II & Liszt: Symphony No. 1 - Invitation to the Dance - On The Beautiful Blue Danube - Tales from the Vienna Woods - Hungarian Rhapsody No. 2
Léopold Stokowski, Hector Berlioz, Philadelphia Orchestra
Classical - Released by Infinity on 30 Nov 2021
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Memoiren des Hector Berlioz
Humour/Spoken Word - Released by Schwarzwasser Verlag on 1 Sep 2007
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berlioz: Famous Classical Works, Vol. XIII
Orchestre de la Société des Concerts du Conservatoire
Classical - Released by SB Clasic on 15 Oct 2002
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Clasicos de Siempre - Berlioz
Classical - Released by Piros Comercial Digital on 19 May 2015
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Symphonie Fantastique (Classical Music Masters)
Classical - Released by Il Loggione Records on 16 Mar 2018
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Los Grandes de la Musica Clasica - Hector Berlioz Vol. 1
Orchestre Symphonique du Festival, Radio Symphony Orchestre Baden-Baden
Classical - Released by ClassicalPirosDigital on 20 Jun 2015
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Great Musicians, Great Music: Herbert von Karajan Performs Berlioz
Classical - Released by YOYO USA Digital on 29 May 2012
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo