Berlioz: Symphonie-Fantastique (4th & 5th Movements)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bb7BJQ7LAlo

A musical treat for Halloween! Pinchas Steinberg conducts the NHK Symphony Orchestra.

Expanded: The symphony is a program piece about a desperate lover who finds his romantic situation hopeless and eventually drugs himself with opium. Its 5 movements depict such an artist-lover’s mental life. The work roused such controversy during its premiere that it was in some circles deemed as being Satanic.  Today, it is a staple in the basic repertoire of programmed orchestral works.

From Berlioz’s original program notes (4th movement):

Convinced that his love is spurned, the artist poisons himself with opium. The dose of narcotic, while too weak to cause his death, plunges him into a heavy sleep accompanied by the strangest of visions. He dreams that he has killed his beloved, that he is condemned, led to the scaffold and is witnessing his own execution. The procession advances to the sound of a march that is sometimes sombre and wild, and sometimes brilliant and solemn, in which a dull 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 final thought of love interrupted by the fatal blow.

From composer’s original program notes (5th movement)

He sees himself at a witches’ sabbath, in the midst of a hideous gathering of shades, sorcerers and monsters of every kind who have come together for his funeral. Strange sounds, groans, outbursts of laughter; distant shouts which seem to be answered by more shouts. The beloved melody appears once more, but has now lost its noble and shy character; it is now no more than a vulgar dance tune, trivial and grotesque: it is she who is coming to the sabbath… Roar of delight at her arrival… She joins the diabolical orgy… The funeral knell tolls, burlesque parody of the Dies irae, the dance of the witches. The dance of the witches combined with the Dies irae.