Orchestral, Chamber, and Choral Music
Composer Biographies
Hector Berlioz
Born: December 11, 1813, La Côte-St-André, Isère, France
Died: March 8, 1869, Paris
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In his own words....
"To render my works properly requires a combination of extreme precision and irresistible verve, a regulated vehemence, a dreamy tenderness, and an almost morbid melancholy."
French composer, conductor, and writer on music. Berlioz played a decisive role in the development of program music and modern orchestration.
The overwhelming majority of Romantic composers were pianists. Many, such as Chopin and Liszt, were virtuoso performers as well as composers. Hector Berlioz was a notable exception to this rule. In fact, he never studied piano. Berlioz was born to a well-to-do family and as a child learned flute and guitar and managed to teach himself the rudiments of harmony from his reading of textbooks. His parents sent him to Paris in 1821 to study medicine (his father was a doctor), but after two years (miserable years by Berlioz's account) he left his studies behind to attend classes at the conservatory.
During his studies at the conservatory, Berlioz competed for the Prix de Rome four times, finally winning it in 1830. It was in this same year that he wrote his most famous piece, the Symphonie fantastique. During this period, he was profoundly influenced by the music of Beethoven (whom he later championed as a critic) and the writings of Shakespeare, Goethe, and the English Romantics. He also came under the spell of the famous Shakespearean actress Harriet Smithson; the story behind the Symphonie fantastiqu e is in part a reflection of his uncontrollable feelings for her. He married her after his return from Rome, but it was a short-lived and troubled marriage. Nonetheless, these years were marked by a string of exceptional and original works, including the programmatic works Harold in Italy and Romeo and Juliet (the first essentially a viola concerto, the second a symphony), his gigantic Requiem and the opera Benvenuto Cellini .
These works were perhaps too original. They did not receive their just recognition and Berlioz turned to musical journalism to support himself. He also began extensive tours as a conductor. Despite the demands of this schedule, he also produced a series of mature masterpieces, among them the operas Les Troyens and Béatrice et Benedict, the dramatic choral work The Damnation of Faust , and the oratorio L'enfance du Christ . His final years were marked by personal tragedy. This was compounded as Berlioz saw the ideals of French Romanticism overtaken by the growing influence of the new German school led by Wagner and others. He died at the age of sixty-seven.
Berlioz stands out for his innovative approach in almost all areas of composition. His Symphonie fantastique , for example, transformed the abstract form of the symphony into a fully dramatic one. His Requiem infused the ancient text with a new and purely nineteenth-century meaning. It was, however, in the area of orchestration that he made his most important mark. His original manner of using and combining instruments was based not on tradition, but on an intuitive sense of what was possible and how it could be most effectively realized. He left for future generations not only the example of his works, but the first textbook of orchestration, resources that have served musicians for well over a century.
Works
- Orchestral music, including overtures Waverley (1828), Rob Roy (1831), Le roi Lear ( King Lear , 1831); and program symphonies Symphonie fantastique (1830), Harold en Italie ( Harold in Italy , 1834), Romeo et Juliette (1839)
- Choral music, including a Requeim Mass (1837), Te Deum ( Hymn of Praise , 1849), La damnation de Faust ( The Damnation of Faust , 1846), and the oratorio L'enfance du Christ ( The Childhood of Christ , 1854)
- 3 operas, including Les Troyens ( The Trojans , 1858) and Béatrice et Bénédict (1862)
- 9 solo vocal works with orchestra
- Writings on music, including an orchestration treatise (1843/55)
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Musical Examples
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Links
- A Brief Biography
From the Classical Music Pages, this is a biographical article extracted from The Grove Concise Dictionary of Music.
- The Hector Berlioz Society Home Page
The best place to go for further exploration. This site contains a great deal of material including quotations of Berlioz, recent recordings, upcoming performances of note, and a variety of pictures. It also has links to other interesting sites.
- Hector Berlioz Website
Felix Mendelssohn
Born: February 3, 1809, Hamburg, Germany
Died: November 4, 1847, Leipzig
Return to Just Listen: Era : Composer
German composer and conductor. Mendelssohn was an important figure in the revival of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach in the nineteenth century.
The Mendelssohn household was one of the cultural centers of Berlin. The family was wealthy thanks to its banking interests, and its garden home served as a concert hall in which Felix and his sister Fanny often performed and had their works played. It was on just such an occasion that the public heard a marvelous work by the seventeen-year-old Felix: his O verture to A Midsummer Night's Dream .
Felix Mendelssohn was something of a prodigy. He wrote his first piece at the age of eleven, beginning a prolific period in which the youth created pieces in virtually every genre from sonatas to concertos and even a Singspiel. At the age of twenty, he conducted a performance of Bach's St. Matthew Passion at the Berlin Singakademie. This was the first modern performance of the work and was an important event in the nineteenth-century rediscovery of Bach.
At about the same time, Felix began to travel widely; the next few years took him to England, Scotland, and Italy. Besides spreading his reputation, these journeys were important for the pieces that they yielded. Some, such as his "Italian" symphony and the Hebrides overture, documented his musical impressions of these voyages.
In 1833, Mendelssohn took a conducting post in Düsseldorf. Two years later he took his most important position, as director of the Gewandhaus in Leipzig. He remained in Leipzig for another ten years, maintaining a busy schedule of performances, conducting works of contemporaries as well as the old masters. He also founded and directed the Leipzig conservatory. His abilities as a conductor and as an organizer of festivals created a great demand for his services. Because of his schedule, most of his compositional work was restricted to the summer months.
In 1847, Felix was devastated by the death of his sister, Fanny, with whom he had an especially close relationship, personally and artistically. His health declined, and after a series of strokes, he died in the same year.
Mendelssohn's music is the most classically oriented of all his generation. This is partly due to his intense study of Bach, Handel, and Mozart, and the influence is best seen in his large choral works such as the oratorios St. Paul and Elijah . At the same time, his clarity of form and the effortless outpouring of his melody bring to mind the same qualities in Mozart. Yet he was a true Romantic, cultivating smaller forms (such as the Lied ) and brief character pieces for the piano. He also showed the Romantic penchant for imbuing his pieces with extramusical associations. As well he had the deep love of literature that marked this generation, a quality that is often an important aspect of his music.
Works
- Orchestral music, including 5 symphonies (No. 3, Scottish , 1842; No. 4, Italian , 1843; No. 5, Reformation , 1830); concert overtures ( A Midsummer Night's Dream , 1826; The Hebrides , or Fingal's Cave , 1830); 2 piano concertos, Violin Concerto in E minor (1844)
- Dramatic music, including 1 opera and incidental music for 6 plays ( A Midsummer Night's Dream , 1843)
- Choral music, including 2 oratorios ( St. Paul , 1836; Elijah , 1846); cantatas, anthems, and part songs
- Chamber music, including 6 string quartets, 2 string quintets, piano quartets, 1 octet, and various sonatas
- Piano music, including Songs Without Words (8 sets, 1829-45); sonatas, fugues, and fantasies
- Organ music; solo vocal music, transcriptions and arrangements of Bach, Handel, Mozart, and Beethoven
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Musical Examples
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Links
- A Basic Biography
This site, from the Classical Music Pages, provides a biographical essay taken from The Grove Concise Dictionary of Music .
- Basic Repertoire and Recordings
The ClassicalNet site provides a list of works with selections of recordings.