11/3/21

PROGRAMMATIC/PROGRAM MUSIC
HECTOR BERLIOZ
SYMPHONIE FANTASTIQUE • “music intended to evoke extra-musical
ideas…[or]…images in the mind of the listener
by musically representing a scene, image or
mood” Wikipedia
• music that projects visual imagery
• the musical suggestion of an “agenda”
• program music culturally based
• learned through suggestion and/or visual
association (opera, film, TV)

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ROMANTIC PROGRAM MUSIC PROGRAM MUSIC

• instrumental compositions
• inspired by extra-musical* sources
• nature (expression of human emotion)
•popular genre in Romantic era (19th • impressions of a voyage
c.) • disappointment in love
•evolved from the use of orchestras in • the occult/mythology
operas to enhance action and • a theatrical play (e.g. Shakespeare)
emotion
*extra-musical = outside music

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PROGRAM = AGENDA
PROGRAM = AGENDA
suggested by:
supported by:
• its title
• musical colors – timbre
•the program notes • musical moods – major or minor
• sound effects (e.g. church bells, cannons)
• new instrumental sounds
• use of new instruments in the orchestra
• effects on existing instruments

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SYMPHONIE FANTASTIQUE
(Symphonic Fantasy)

• written by music and theater critic Hector Berlioz

• debuted in Paris in 1830
• autobiographical work based on his “fixation”
• with Irish Shakespearean actress Harriet Smithson
• and his own personal demons with opium
• had little formal musical training
• not a professional musician

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PROGRAMMATIC INNOVATIONS PROGRAMMATIC INNOVATIONS

• (heightened dramatic impact)

• 5 movements instead of usual 4
• new instrumental textures
• deviation from symphonic form within
movements • ophicleide (early tuba)
• use of an extra-large orchestra • English horn (lower oboe)
• extreme instrumental ranges to create • cornet (from military band)
unusual timbres • saxophone (newly-invented)
• harps
• Church bells

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EXAMPLE 3-3: IDÉE FIXE (fixed idea) PART ONE: REVERIES – PASSIONS
(DREAMS-PASSIONS)
• musical theme
The author imagines that a young musician,
• representing the: afflicted with that moral disease that a well-
• “artist’s beloved” known writer calls the vague des passions,
• his own “fixation” sees for the first time a woman who embodies
all the charms of the ideal being he has
• appears transformed in all 5 movements imagined in his dreams, and he falls
desperately in love with her. Through an odd
whim, whenever the beloved image appears
before the mind’s eye of the artist it is linked
with a musical thought whose character,
passionate but at the same time noble and shy,
he finds similar to the one he attributes to his
beloved.

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PART ONE: REVERIES – PASSIONS

(DREAMS-PASSIONS) EXAMPLE 3-4: REVERIES-PASSIONS

This melodic image and the model it reflects • first movement

pursue him incessantly like a double idée fixe. • loose Sonata-Allegro Form
That is the reason for the constant appearance, • slow Introduction “state of melancholy
in every moment of the symphony, of the reverie”
melody that begins the first Allegro. The
• first appearance of the idée fixe which
passage from this state of melancholy reverie,
interrupted by a few fits of groundless joy, to appears in its complete form three times in
one of frenzied passion, with its movements of first movement, each time changed
instrumentally, dynamically, & stylistically
fury, of jealousy, its return of tenderness, its
tears, its religious consolations – this is the
subject of the first movement.

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PART TWO: A BALL

The artist finds himself in the most Idee fixe transformed into a waltz in
varied situations – in the midst of the tumult
of a party, in the peaceful contemplation of the trio section representing Harriet
the beauties of nature; but everywhere, in Smithson’s presence at the party
town, in the country, the beloved image
appears before him and disturbs his peace of
mind.

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PART THREE:
EXAMPLE 3-5: PART TWO: A BALL SCENE IN THE COUNTRY
Finding himself one evening in the country, he
• Minuet and Trio (ternary form) hears in the distance two shepherds piping a ranz des
• Triple meter vaches in dialogue. This pastoral duet, the scenery,
the quiet rustling of the trees gently brushed by the
• begins with waltz (1-2-3,1-2-3,1-2-3,etc.) wind, the hopes he has recently found some reason to
• idée fixe melody changed into waltz in trio entertain – all concur in affording his heart an
unaccustomed calm, and in giving a more cheerful
section color to his ideas. He reflects upon his isolation; he
• use of four harps hopes that his loneliness will soon be over. –But what
if she were deceiving him! –This mingling of hope and
fear, these ideas of happiness disturbed by black
presentiments, form the subject of the Adagio. At the
end one of the shepherds again takes up the ranz des
vaches; the other no longer replies. –Distant sound of
thunder – loneliness – silence.

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EXAMPLE 3-6a and 3-6b: PART THREE: PART FOUR:

SCENE IN THE COUNTRY MARCH TO THE SCAFFOLD
Convinced that his love is unappreciated, the
• Pastoral effect artist poisons himself with opium. The dose of the
• Romantic device (from Beethoven) narcotic, too weak to kill him, plunges him into a
sleep accompanied by the most horrible visions.
• nature as reflection of emotions He dreams that he has killed his beloved, that he is
• shepherds’ bagpipes represented by condemned and led to the scaffold, and that he is
witnessing his own execution. The procession
antiphonal English horn & oboe offstage moves forward to the sounds of a march that is
• idée fixe in woodwinds now somber and fierce, now brilliant and solemn,
in which the muffled noise of heavy steps gives
• English horn (unanswered emotions) way without transition to the noisiest clamor. At
• timpani – “distant thunder” the end of the march the first four measures of the
idée fixe reappear, like a last thought of love
interrupted by the fatal blow.

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EXAMPLE 3-7: MARCH TO THE SCAFFOLD PART FIVE:

DREAM OF A WITCHES’ SABBATH

He sees himself at the Sabbath, in the midst of

two themes alternate: a frightful troop of ghosts, sorcerers, monsters of
1) gloomy and wild every kind, come together for his funeral. Strange
2) military march noises, groans, bursts of laughter, distant cries
which other cries seem to answer. The beloved
• rising melody represents ascending the melody appears again, but it has lost its character
stairs of the execution platorm of nobility and shyness; it is no more than a dance
• idée fixe briefly appears in clarinet at end tune, mean, trivial, and grotesque: it is she,
coming to join the sabbath. –A roar of joy at her
• “chopped off” by guillotine arrival. –She takes part in the devilish orgy. –
Funeral knell, burlesque parody of the Dies irae,
sabbath round-dance. The Sabbath round and the
Dies irae combined.

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EXAMPLE 3-8:
DREAM OF A WITCHES’ SABBATH
EXAMPLE 3-8:
DREAM OF A WITCHES’ SABBATH
• eerie effects by
muted strings,
Dies Irae “Day of Wrath” melody
woodwinds, and
French horns (Gregorian chant from Mass for the Dead)
• herky-jerky idée fixe • played first by tubas & bassoons
played by squeaky • then faster by trombones & horns
e-flat clarinet • then faster still by woodwinds
• Gothic church bells
representing the
Church and death

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EXAMPLE 3-8:
DREAM OF A WITCHES’ SABBATH “Last Night’s Symphonie”

“Witches Round Dance”

• polyphonic fugue (shows Baroque influence)
• Dies Irae & Round Dance combined
• produces chaotic effect
• regarded as sacrilegious to audience
• col legno strings* = crackling hellfire

*col legno – on the wood

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