Hector Berlioz -- Symphonie Fantastique -- Score

Would you be surprised to learn that the first instance of "psychedelic music" dates back to the 19th Century? Granted, the drug of choice was opium, not LSD, but the effects were a very bad trip.

The symphony is somewhat autobiographical, reflecting Berlioz's infatuation with the Irish actress Harriet Smithson, after seeing her performing as Ophelia in Hamlet. Despite writing this symphony in 1830, Berlioz and Smithson didn't actually meet until 1832, and they were married in October 1833. However, the marriage was unstable, and Smithson moved out of their home in 1843, though Berlioz continued to support her financially until her death in 1854.

The symphony is built around the idée fixe, a theme that recurs in each of the five movements, representing the obsession of the titular "artist". Berlioz provided program notes to each of the movements.

0:00 I. "Daydreams--Passions"
The author imagines that a young musician, afflicted with that emotional affliction which a famous writer calls the vague des passions, sees for the first time a woman who unites all the charms of the ideal being of which his imagination dreamed, and he becomes madly in love with her. By a singular oddity, the cherished image never presents itself to the artist's mind except in connection with a musical idea, in which he finds a certain passionate, but noble and timid character like that which he attributes to the beloved object.

This melodic reflection and its model pursue him incessantly like a double idée fixe. That is the reason for the constant appearance, in all the movements of the symphony, of the melody that begins the first allegro. The passage from this state of melancholic reverie, interrupted by a few fits of unprovoked joy, to that of a delirious passion, with its movements of fury, jealousy, returns of tenderness, tears, and religious consolations, is the subject of the first movement.

14:08 II. "A ball"
The artist is placed in the most diverse circumstances of life, in the midst of the tumult of a festival, in the peaceful contemplation of the beauties of nature. But everywhere, in the city, in the fields, the cherished image comes to present itself to him and stirs up trouble in his soul.

20:35 III. "Scene in the country"
One evening, finding himself in the country, he hears two shepherds playing a ranz des vaches on their pipes. This pastoral duet, the scenery, the slight rustling of the trees gently stirred by the wind, some hopes that he has lately found reason to conceive, all conspire to restore to his heart an unaccustomed calm, to give to his ideas a more cheerful colour. He reflects on his isolation; he hopes his loneliness will soon be over. But what if she betrays him!... This mixture of hope and fear, these ideas of happiness, disturbed by some dark forebodings, form the subject of the adagio. At the end, one of the shepherds resumes the ranz des vaches; the other no longer responds. Distant sound of thunder ... solitude ... silence...

35:34 IV. "March to the scaffold"
Having grown sure that his love is unappreciated, the artist poisons himself with opium. The dose of the narcotic, too small to kill him, plunges him into a sleep accompanied by the most horrible visions. He dreams that he has killed the one he loved, that he is condemned, that he is being led to execution, and that he is witnessing his own guillotining. The procession advances to the sounds of a march sometimes dark and fierce, sometimes brilliant and solemn, in which a muffled sound of heavy footsteps follows without transition the loudest outbursts. At the end of the march, the first four bars of the idée fixe reappear like a last thought of love interrupted by the fatal blow.

39:59 V. "Dream of a night of the sabbath"
He sees himself at a sabbath, in the middle of a horrible troop of ghosts, sorcerers, and monsters of all kinds gathered together for his funeral. Strange noises, moans, bursts of laughter, distant cries to which other cries seem to respond. The beloved melody reappears again, but it has lost its character of nobility and timidity; it is no more than a dance tune – ignoble, trivial and grotesque; it is she who is coming to the sabbath ... Roar of joy as she arrives ... She joins in the diabolical orgy. Funeral knell, burlesque parody of the Dies irae, witches' round dance. The round and the Dies irae together.

Score sourced through the International Music Score Library Project/Petrucci Music Library: https://imslp.org/wiki/Special:Imagef...

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