BERLIOZ Symphonie Fantastique San Diego Symphony Orchestra Yoav Talmi Hector Berlioz (1803-1 869) Symphonie Fantastique, Op
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BERLIOZ Symphonie Fantastique San Diego Symphony Orchestra Yoav Talmi Hector Berlioz (1803-1 869) Symphonie Fantastique, Op. 14 (An Episc~de in the Life of an Artist) Hector Berlioz was born in the French province of marital amatory preoccupations assumed greater Issre in 1803, the son of a doctor. He abandoned his importance. own medical studies, on which his father bad insisted, The S~~~frphurriefffr~tffstiq~~e is a remarkable work, to become a musician, but was to remain an outsider as autobiographical in content and immensely influential far as the musical establishment in Paris was in the path it suggested to future composers, anxious to concerned, his music seeming at times extravagantly extend the scope of musical expression in the bizarre, his character, to say the least, difficult, and his generation after Beethoven. Described as Ari Episode literary activities, as a music critic, controversial. in tlre Life of a11 Artist, the symphony is haunted by an It was in 1824 that Berlioz finally gave up idiejire, a recurrent fragment of melody, symbolizing medicine. His first visit to the dissecting-room, the beloved, a prototype of the Leitmotiv, to be decribed in lurid terms in his Mertioirs, provided an developed by Wagner. In 1830 the autobiographical initial and startling disincentive, as he saw birds nature of the symphony represented something entirely fighting for scraps of human lungs and rats in the new. comer of the room, gnawing vertebrae. At the same A young musician, in despair, has poisoned time Paris offered musical opportunities. There was the himself with opium and in a long sleep has a series of Opera, and the Conservatoire Library was open to the vivid dreams and nightmares, the idea of his beloved public. He was able to profit, too, by lessons from coming again and again to his mind. He recalls the joys Lesueur, whose class he was later to enter at the and depressions of the past, before she came into his Conservatoire, where he became a student in 1826. life, and then the neurotic despair and jealousy that her The following year Berlioz saw Shakespeare's appearance brought him, with passing consolation in Hurrrlet for the first time, with Charles Kemble as the religious serenity. The second movement evokes the Prince and the Irish actress Harriet Smithson as music of a ball, at which, in the swirl of the dance, he Ophelia. The experience was overwhelming, catches glimpses of his beloved again. This is followed accentuated by the performance of Ror~ieoarrd Jrlliet by a third movement that cost the composer much that he saw a few days later. During the season he had labour. In the countryside two shepherd boys play a the opportunity to see much more of the visiting melody to call the cows, and all is tranquillity until the English company sharing in the popular adulation of beloved appears again, with all the anxious Harriet Smithson, with whom he fell violently in love. questioning that that must provoke. A shepherd plays The Syr~ipl~oriiefaritastiq11e was written in reaction his pipe, but this time there is no answer, and as the sun to the intense and unreciprocated passion Berlioz felt sets distant thunder is heard, followed by silence. Tlie for Harriet Smithson, and with something of the March to the Scaffold, written in one night, brings a resentment he felt, possibly augmented by his brief dream of the murder of the beloved, for which the hero association with Camille Make, who was to many the is condemned to death. The march, with its steady piano manufacturer Pleyel. In the end Berlioz was to tread, has its wilder moments, as the procession makes marry his Ophelia, a match that brought neither of its way through the crowd. The beloved appears at the them any lasting satisfaction, as her own career waned moment before the axe falls. The final movement is a into querulous drunkenness and his musical and extra- Witches' Sabbath, a wild orgy of diabolic celebration, the id>efi.~eof the beloved now a shrill mockery. The Judgement from the Requiem Mass, mingles with the death knell is heard and the sound of the traditional dance, as the work draws to an end. chant of the Dies irae, the hymn of the Day of Keith Anderson San Diego Symphony Orchestra The San Diego Symphony Orchestra, founded in the second decade of the twentieth century, is the oldest performing arts organization of America's sixth largest city, offering a year-round schedule of serious and popular concerts, as well as innovative outreach and audience development programmes. With a complement of 81 players the orchestra has its winter season in Copley Symphony Hall, an opulent building that was once a cinema but is now owned by the San Diego Symphony Association. Winter season concerts also include silent films with orchestral accompaniment, a series of concerts for young people and multi-cultural concerts, representing the cultural diversity of the city. From July through to September, the Symphony presents an outdoor ten-week Summer Pops season. Yoav Talmi Yoav Talmi is well known and much appreciated as a conductor on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. He regularly conducts major orchestras in Europe, North America, Israel and New Zealand and is currently serving as Chief Conductor of the Hamhurg Symphony in Germany and Music Director of the Canadian Quebec Symphony Orchestra. Yoav Talmi works extensively in Europe and has conducted the Berlin, St Petersburg, Oslo, Stockholm and Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestras, the Prague, Hamhurg and Vienna Symphony Orchestras, the Orchestre National de France, Zurich's Tonhalle, Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, Santa Cecilia, BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra and most of the Radio Orchestras of France, Italy, Spain, Germany, The Netherlands, Belgium, Finland, Poland and Sweden. In North America, he has been invited to conduct the orchestras of Pittsburgh, Detroit, Saint- Louis, Houston, Montreal, Indianapolis, Dallas, Seattle and the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa, and has appeared in many major festivals, including Aspen, Lanaudikre (Montreal), Chautauqau, Waterloo and Houston (Mostly Mozart). Yoav Talmi won early success as Music Director of the Arnhem Philharmonic in The Netherlands from 1974 until 1980, with a season as Principal Guest Conductor of the Munich Philharmonic and a period as Music Director of the Israel Chamber Orchestra and the New Israeli Opera. From 1989 until 1996 he was Music Director of the San Diego Symphony in California. Born in Israel, Yoav Talmi graduated from the Ruhin Academy of Music in Tel Aviv and the Juilliard School in New York and was the recipient of the Koussevitzky Memorial Conducting Prize (Tanglewood Festival) and winner of the Rupert Conductor's Competition in London. He also holds an honorary doctorate from Lava1 University in Quebec. He has won considerable acclaim for his recordings for major record companies. die Freuden und Leiden der Vergangenheit in Held traumt, daB er seine Geliebte umgebracht hat und Erinnemng, bevor sie in sein Leben getreten ist, und dafiir zum Tode verurteilt worden ist. Mit mhigem, danach die neurotische Verzweiflung und Eifersucht, festen Schritt geht der Marsch vonvirts, hat aber auch die ihr Erscheinen bei ihm ausgelost hat, wohei er seine wilderen Momente, wenn sich der Zug seinen voriibergehend Trost in religioser Versenkung findet Weg durch die Menge bahnt. Die Geliebte erscheint in (der erste Satz Traume - Leidenschafen). Der zweite dem Moment kurz bevor das Beil fallt. Der letzte Satz Satz Ein Ball beschwort Walzerklange herauf; im ist ein Traum vom Hexensabbat, von einer wilden tanzerischen Wirbel des Balles fangt der Held die Orgie der Teufelsanhetung, bei der die Geliebte als Blicke seiner Geliebten ein. Mit dem dritten Satz Hexe erscheint; ibre idCe fixe wird ins Schrill- Szetle auf den8 Lande hat der Komponist lange Spottische vemrrt. Man hort die Todesglocke und die gerungen. Zwei Hirtenjungen spielen eine Melodie, Klange des Dies irae (der gregorianische Hymnus um die Kiihe zu mfen. Alles ist ruhig und friedlich, bis vom Tag des Jiingsten Gerichts aus der Totenmesse), die Geliebte wieder erscheint, und mit ihr all die die sich gegen Ende des Werkes mit dem Fragen und Zweifel, die den Helden qualen. Ein Hirte Hexenrundtanz vermischen. spiel1 auf seiner Flote, diesmal bleibt jedoch die Antwoa aus. Als die Sonne untergeht, hort man fernen Keith Anderson Donner, danach ist Stille. Den vieaen Satz Gang zunl Richtplatz hat Berlioz in einer Nacht kompo~ert.Der Deiitsche Fossung: Tilo Kittel Hector Berlioz (1803-1 869) Symphonie Fantastique, Op. 14 p pis ode de la vie d'un artiste) Hector Berlioz est nC dans I'Isbre en 1803, le fils Berlioz peut profiter aussi des lesons de Lesueur, d'un medecin. I1 abandonne ses etudes de medecine, entrant par la suite dans sa classe au Conse~atoire,oh contre le souhait de son pbre, pour devenir musicien, il Ctudie dbs 1826. mais il devait toujours rester en dehors de L'annCe suivante Berlioz voit Hamlet de I'establishment musical B Paris, sa musique paraissant Shakespeare pour la premibre fois, avec Charles parfois bizarrement extravagante, et son caractbre - Kemble dans le file du Prince et I'actrice irlandaise pour dire le moins - difficile, sans parler de son activitC Harriet Smithson dans le rBle d'ophtlie. Cette liltbraire comme critique de musique qui Ctait trbs expirience bouleversante est renforcde par une controvers&. repr6entation de Ronrio et Juliette quelques jours plus C'est en 1824 que Berlioz renonce enfin B la tard. Au cours de la saison il peut B maintes occasions midecine. Sa premibre visite B une salle de dissection, voir d'autres repdsentations de la troupe anglaise en lieu don1 une description effaraute se trouve dans ses visite, partageant I'engouement du public pour Harriet Mkmoires, fournit un premier dknuragement de taille, Smithson au point d'en tomber violemment amoureux.