And now for the GRAND NUMBER ONE WINNER OF THE TOP 30 CHART!!!

*Fanfares*

1. Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique (Episode de la vie d'un artiste), Op.14 (1830)

When I first heard the Symphonie Fantastique several years back, I was bowled over. Something in it really struck a chord that held me in awe and alacrity through its entire running time, and after it finished my life had just become a whole lot richer, and it ignited in me a life-long admiration for the music of Hector Berlioz. Written in 1830 when Berlioz was still just a struggling, up-and-coming composer, the work truly revolutionised peoples' thinking on the future of music by presenting such an unusual, yet dramatically satisfying work that was new and fresh. The simple audacity of it was such a feat for a 26-year-old man not in the best of personal relations with the Paris Conservatoire (the director Cherubini hated Berlioz) that many stood up and took notice. Yet in the heat of his passions and eccentric thoughts, he also managed to pull it off without looking too much like a complete screwball… though he did earn a reputation for garishness. The work is partly autobiographical and the inspirations of the work act in an extremely important part of Berlioz's life and his future development. In the late 1820s, an Irish theatre company came to Paris to perform works by Shakespeare. Berlioz didn't understand English, but he was riveted by the stories and passions behind the stories to ignore this fact and went to see the performances. It was there that he saw Harriet Smithson, a young actress who had already garnered a bit of a reputation in France. Berlioz was sold immediately. To him, Harriet represented every romantic daydream and ideal of what a woman to him meant, and her performances made him intoxicated. Many times he tried to get closer to her (even once staging one of his compositions to be performed at the start of one of the plays), but he always got too nervous even to the point of Harriet becoming slightly apprehensive of the "strange man who's eyes bode no well", a comment which was illicited as during one rehearsal Berlioz gave a frightened scream in front of her and ran away wringing his hands. In the end Berlioz never did get his chance to get near her, and she left Paris without ever knowing the name Hector Berlioz.

Berlioz was crushed, and in his moment of despair, started writing a symphony, to which he appended a written programme of a young artist in the throws of love. This resulted in a highly colourful and truly personable work that was unique and contained many never before heard of elements. Beginning with a slow introduction (marked "Dreams"), the melancholy music tells how “the artist first remembers the uneasiness of spirit, the undefinable passion, the melancholy, the aimless joys he felt before seeing his beloved.” There is a slight feeling of hope in the music as well, but the melancholy of loneliness returns once more, leading directly into the main part of the movement called "Passions", in which the "beloved" makes her first appearance. This was one of Berlioz's penchant innovations: the idée fixe (obsession). The beloved is characterised by a sweet and innocent melody "in which he recognises a certain quality of passion, but endowed with the nobility and shyness which he credits to the object of his love." This idée fixe then flits in and out of the work throughout all the movements, never leaving the artist alone, indeed very much like a continuous obsession. The idée fixe very much dominates the first movement as a sort of mood picture of the artist’s different states of mind throughout the movement, initially reaching out to exceedingly passionate outbursts of delirious joy of new-found love. The development section (though not really containing a second subject) again brings a bit more darker tones in the cellos and basses, while going through ”delirious passion, with its outbursts of jealousy and fury, the returns of tenderness, and its tears,” finally ending after a passionately full on climax on the idée fixe’s melody with the soothing feeling of ”religious consolations.”

The second movement sees the artist entering a glittering and festive ball, with harp glisses and low strings drawing the listener in before brightly expanding into a tender and graceful waltz, very much the epitome of elegance and easy-moving luxury. The two harps particularly add a great sense of festive glitter to the proceedings, something taken straight out of Gluck’s operatic practices. In the midst of the waltzing people, however, the artist "again sees his beloved,” the introduction of the idée fixe for a moment quieting down the waltz as well, but it is not long before the waltz melody returns, going around and together with the idée fixe, as if she is flitting through the denizens of dancers. Near the end of the movement, the idée fixe is allowed to be heard one last time without the waltz interfering at all. The movement ends in a whirlpool of festive gaiety as the rest of the partygoers dance to their hearts’ content in the face of the suffering artist. The lengthy third movement contrasts to the preceding movements in being very calm and relaxed as the artist has withdrawn to the peace of the countryside. The movement opens with the plaintive shepherd’s call on cor anglais, a very pastoral idea if there ever was one. This simple melody is then repeated by another shepherd off-stage, and thus the two continue their duet as the rest of the orchestra gradually rises from the emptiness with the movement’s main theme. “This pastoral duet, the setting, the gentle rustling of the trees in the light wind, some causes for hope that he has recently conceived, all conspire to restore to his heart an unaccustomed feeling of calm and to give to his thoughts a happier colouring.”

The movement bears quite an affinity to Beethoven’s similarly pastoral tinged Sixth Symphony with its depictions of country life, also being in F major and featuring similarly conceived bird song in the wind instruments, though Berlioz’s handling of the nature is much more isolated and lonely than Beethoven’s distinctly sing-along approach. In the middle of the movement a sudden change of tone takes place as agitation again enters the artist’s heart as the idée fixe makes a sudden appearance: ”She reappears, he feels a pang of anguish, and painful thoughts disturb him: what if she betrayed him…” This episode over, however, the nature themes return to try and sooth the man’s heart anew, and even the return of the idée fixe doesn’t raise such bouts of jealously anymore. The movement ends very evocatively on a slightly sad note as the opening shepherd’s melody returns: ”One of the shepherds resumes his simple melody; the other one no longer answers. The sun sets... distant sound of thunder… solitude… silence…” The combination of the shepherd’s melody and the answering barrage of timpani rolls simulating thunder is incredibly effective, perfectly contrasting the warmth of the movement’s opening with the closing’s melancholy and loneliness.

The fourth movement then takes a drastic turn to the worse. “Convinced that his love is spurned, the artist poisons himself with opium. The dose of narcotic, while too weak to cause his death, plunges him into a heavy sleep accompanied by the strangest of visions. He dreams that he has killed his beloved, that he is condemned, led to the scaffold and is witnessing his own execution.” The opening is once again very evocative as the low brass and heavy timpani bring about a great sense of impending doom. This dark introduction finally leads the artist into the streets amid the jeering and shouting crowd here to witness the execution. The main march is extremely garish and French, showing the people’s love for the public spectacle of execution: ”The procession advances to the sound of a march that is sometimes sombre and wild, and sometimes brilliant and solemn, in which a dull sound of heavy footsteps follows without transition the loudest outbursts.” As we reach the scaffold, we hear a sudden reappearance of the idée fixe melody, ”like a final thought of love” that is cut short by the blade of the guillotine (with the fun detail of two pizzicato to represent his head dropping into a basket). The movement ends with the utmost sense of jubilation with blaring brass, snare drumming and cymbal crashes. This immediately leads into the finale, beginning with some of the most interesting sound design ever heard in music before, the sounds barely resemble music at all (and for 1830 this is really something unusual): “He sees himself at a witches’ Sabbath, in the midst of a hideous gathering of shades, sorcerers and monsters of every kind who have come together for his funeral. Strange sounds, groans, outbursts of laughter; distant shouts which seem to be answered by more shouts.” These sounds are finally dispelled by a tremendous crescendo, that is followed by the familiar idée fixe, but ”it has now lost its noble and shy character; it is now no more than a vulgar dance tune, trivial and grotesque: it is she who is coming to the Sabbath… Roar of delight at her arrival… She joins the diabolical orgy…”

This spell, however, is but brief, and the music quickly sinks to darkness as the funeral proper begins: ”The funeral knell tolls,” which is followed by a ”burlesque parody of the Dies Irae,” the traditional Gregorian church melody for the Day of Judgement. This traditional Gregorian melody takes on a morbid and parodied appearance of a country band’s performance, solemn and sounding intentionally terrible (or at least it is supposed to). This moment is followed by the tumultuous Witches’ Dance that is completely disrespectful and nightmarishly vulgar. The Dies Irae occasionally reminds you of where you are, but it is not long before the two elements are combined into a hellish orgy of indecency and religious perversion. Among the combinations of sounds, one of the most interesting is the ”col legno” passage near the conclusion of the movement, simulating the dancing of skeletons by having the violinists play with the wood of their bow, not the string. The symphony finally ends in a blaze of C major triumph, though there is no mistake about it: this is the triumph of agony, not of salvation, exemplified by the Artist's terrified scream before the final onslaught. This is all incredibly inventive stuff, and considering Beethoven had only been dead for three years prior, the Symphonie Fantastique quite easily falls into being one of the most magnificent first symphonies anybody's ever written. It was later followed by the rarely heard sequel "Lélio: or the Return to Life", but that never reached anywhere near the same popularity of its predecessor.

And as for Harriet? Well, she eventually did hear of this “tribute” to her, and was intrigued enough to meet Berlioz. Her career at this point was already spiralling down and with this newly found sense of attention was quick to grab the opportunity. The two eventually married, though Berlioz’s “Juliet,” his “Ophelia,” proved to be a little different to his imagination and their relationship was extremely stormy, finally ending in their separation (though not divorce). Harriet also ended up being paralysed after an accident and she continued to be a ball-in-chain for Berlioz until her death in 1854. Indeed, romantic dreams are fine as long as they remain as such. For Berlioz, it proved his ultimate success and also one of his greatest disappointments.


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And there you have it. My top 30 favourite classical works. Hopefully the one or two people who actually read all of these journals enjoyed them, and perhaps were even sparked to want to check some of these out if they already hadn't. But I've written enough on this subject to last me some time, so that's it for me.