Théophile Gautier says that no one will deny to Berlioz a great
character, though, the world being given to controversies, it may be
argued whether or not he was a great genius. The world of to-day has
but one opinion on both these questions. The force of Berlioz's
character was phenomenal. His vitality was so passionate and active
that brain and nerve quivered with it, and made him reach out towards
experience at every facet of his nature. Quietude was torture, rest a
sin, for this daring temperament. His eager and subtile intelligence
pierced every sham, and his imagination knew no bounds to its sweep,
oftentimes even disdaining the bounds of art in its audacity and
impatience. This big, virile nature, thwarted and embittered by
opposition, became hardened into violent self-assertion; this
naturally resolute will settled back into fierce obstinacy; this fine
nature, sensitive and sincere, got torn and ragged with passion under
the stress of his unfortunate life. But, at one breath of true
sympathy how quickly the nobility of the man asserted itself! All his
cynicism and hatred melted away, and left only sweetness, truth, and
genial kindness.
When Berlioz entered on his studies, he had reached an age at which
Mozart, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Rossini, and others, had already done
some of the best work of their lives. Yet it took only a few years to
achieve a development that produced such a great work as the
"Symphonie Fantastique," the prototype of modern programme music.
From first to last it was the ambition of Berlioz to widen the domain
of his art. He strove to attain a more intimate connection between
instrumental music and poetry in the portrayal of intense passions,
and the suggestion of well-defined dramatic situations. In spite of
the fact that he frequently overshot his mark, it does not make his
works one whit less astonishing. An uncompromising champion of what
has been dubbed "programme" music, he thought it legitimate to force
the imagination of the hearer to dwell on exterior scenes during the
progress of the music, and to distress the mind in its attempt to find
an exact relation between the text and the music. The most perfect
specimens of the works of Berlioz, however, are those in which the
music speaks for itself, such as the "Scène aux Champs," and the
"Marche au Supplice," in the "Symphonie Fantastique," the "Marche des
Pèlerins," in "Harold;" the overtures to "King Lear," "Benvenuto
Cellini," "Carnaval Romain," "Le Corsaire," "Les Francs Juges," etc.
As a master of the orchestra, no one has been the equal of Berlioz in
the whole history of music, not even Beethoven or Wagner. He treats
the orchestra with the absolute daring and mastery exercised by
Paganini over the violin, and by Liszt over the piano. No one has
showed so deep an insight into the individuality of each instrument,
its resources, the extent to which its capabilities could be carried.
Between the phrase and the instrument, or group of instruments, the
equality is perfect; and independent of this power, made up equally of
instinct and knowledge, this composer shows a sense of orchestral
colour in combining single instruments so as to form groups, or in the
combination of several separate groups of instruments by which he has
produced the most novel and beautiful effects--effects not found in
other composers. The originality and variety of his rhythms, the
perfection of his instrumentation, have never been disputed even by
his opponents. In many of his works, especially those of a religious
character, there is a Cyclopean bigness of instrumental means used,
entirely beyond parallel in art. Like the Titans of old, he would
scale the very heavens in his daring. In one of his works he does not
hesitate to use three orchestras, three choruses (all of full
dimensions), four organs, and a triple quartet. The conceptions of
Berlioz were so grandiose that he sometimes disdained detail, and the
result was that more than one of his compositions have rugged grandeur
at the expense of symmetry and balance of form.
Yet, when he chose, Berlioz could write the most exquisite and dainty
lyrics possible. What could be more exquisitely tender than many of
his songs and romances, and various of the airs and choral pieces from
"Beatrice et Benedict," from "Nuits d'Été," "Irlande," and from
"L'Enfance du Christ?"
Berlioz in his entirety, as man and composer, was a most extraordinary
being, to whom the ordinary scale of measure can hardly be applied.
Though he founded no new school, he pushed to a fuller development the
possibilities to which Beethoven reached out in the Ninth Symphony. He
was the great _virtuoso_ on the orchestra, and on this Briarean
instrument he played with the most amazing skill. Others have
surpassed him in the richness of the musical substance out of which
their tone-pictures are woven, in symmetry of form, in finish of
detail; but no one has ever equalled him in that absolute mastery over
instruments, by which a hundred become as plastic and flexible as one,
and are made to embody every phase of the composer's thought with that
warmth of colour and precision of form long believed to be necessarily
confined to the sister arts.
[Decoration]