Fantasia is the most chaotic, novel and popular among Berlioz's works. The audience trained by Beethoven's and Brahms' symphonies, and even brukner's symphonies, will be amazed when faced with this unusual work, trying to find out whether it is really a symphony with recognized significance. However, it was Berlioz's real discovery of Beethoven's symphonies that prompted this work: without this discovery, he would undoubtedly not have written any symphonies at all. Before the age of twenty-four, his music developed rapidly, but it was obviously similar to other composers such as Gluck, Le Xueer's His Teacher, Chebini, Saccini and other works he listened to with great enthusiasm in the opera house. Then came the most turbulent period of my career. 1827- 1830. He lived under intense emotional pressure and mental pressure, and created many amazing and creative music. Symphony Fantasia reached its peak and became one of the most distinctive music documents in the main romantic movement.
Romantic literature lovers intoxicated by Schiller, Gregory or Hugo probably never thought that Haydn and Mozart's art could show a new realm in this respect. Romanticism was originally a literary movement, which flourished in a concept of painting and poetry that was too bold and crazy for people in the eighteenth century; Music, which lacks the ability to accurately describe things and thoughts, is just powerfully suitable for this new expression. About infinity, the unimaginable and the human soul itself-no other artistic means can compare with music in expressiveness, because music has unparalleled ability in inspiring, associating and insight into the unpredictable depth of the soul. The most popular themes-hopeless love, irresistible passion, unattainable femininity, despair, death, nightmare and supernatural power-and the inspiration generated by the artist under the impulse of emotion for a moment, all of which appeared in music for the first time in Fantasia Symphony. People suddenly find that music itself is a kind of romantic art, which is no different from the recognized romantic art.
1827, Berlioz was a highly sensitive person, vulnerable to a series of powerful external influences, which strengthened his already strong imagination. Among those factors that had a great influence on him, the first and strongest one was a visit to Paris by a British troupe composed of kemble, Keane and Macready. In September of that year, they staged a series of Shakespeare's plays in Odeon Theatre, which shocked the enthusiastic youth circles representing that generation-Hugo, De Winnie, Gautier, Dumas, Nelval, Delacroix and Berlioz. One of the musicians joined in their praise of Shakespeare, even more warmly than their worship of the heroine Hattier Smithsonian. It is said that the heroine's Irish accent has damaged her overall success in London. In his memoirs, he told us that he was walking in the street in a state of extreme excitement, and he could hardly muster up the courage to go back to the theater and let his feelings accept the second and third shocks. Personal influence seemed to be more dominant at that time. Shakespeare's discovery slowly had a profound influence on his music.
Two such shocks followed: one was reading the translation of Goethe's Faust by Gerard de Nerval, and the other was the French premiere of the Symphony of Heroes by Paris Conservatory of Music1March, 828. The back of Goethe's plays troubled him for a whole year. We know that there is a Faust symphony and a Faust ballet, but only a set of eight scenes in Faust, which later became the core of Faust's scourge, was completed. He read Thomas Moore's Irish Short Songs and composed nine of them at 1829. /kloc-in the spring of 0/830, his love for harriet Smithsonian was disillusioned because of her indifference, and a new work suddenly took shape. If we can experience the whole inner experience in the outline of Beethoven's symphony. The flash of epiphany makes a work with eternal charm, loved by people and playing a cornerstone role in the history of music emerge as the times require. The symphony Fantasia premiered at the Paris Conservatory of Music on February 5th, 1830.
When writing this symphony, not all the music is new. In many places, he used existing materials that seemed suitable for his drama and symphony design. This symphony is a drama: its dazzling novelty is that it clearly shows personal experience in five movements, just like a drama. So its real name is an episode in an artist's life. Because it lives in a world full of fantasies and dreams, it has the subtitle of Fantasia Symphony. The unity of music comes from the recognition of the artist's own experience and the use of various themes that Berlioz called idee fixe, which appear repeatedly in all five movements with different faces. The change of this theme is a new application of a very old technology (not to mention Berlioz's technology of changing one theme into another). This ancient technology became a common technology of music technology through Liszt in the late19th century, and we can see why it is so useful. It produces diversity in unity, with the same theme but different. In this piece of music, the change of theme is the same object that the artist sees in different backgrounds and moods-the person he loves.
Berlioz imitated Beethoven's pastoral symphony and added descriptive titles to each movement, and developed this practice. When 1846 announced the soundtrack, Berlioz said that there was no need to always disclose the detailed title content to the audience, and the action title was enough. He hopes that the music itself can fully arouse the interest of the audience. This statement is not entirely correct, because everything in the score is by no means self-evident. Composers do occasionally feel guilty because their music performance is too simple, and Beethoven also tries to avoid saying that he has described nightingales, cuckoos and quails, which is obviously wrong. Mahler was also embarrassed by the title of his first symphony. If his symphony Fantasia had no title, it would be difficult to understand March of Death, Country Scenery and The Witch's Sabbath Night's Dream, including Diesirae's Song of the Plain. Berlioz not only gave us a direct and rare insight into the operation of his imagination, but also made everything easy to understand through his written explanation. We may not like Berlioz's explanation of notes, but at least this is his own explanation: it also forms an episode in the artist's life:
"A young musician with morbid allergic temperament and rich imagination committed suicide with opium under the blow of a desperate love. The dose of opium is too small to be fatal, but it makes him fall into a deep sleep and enter a strange dream; In his dream, consciousness, emotion and memory all became musical images and themes in his disordered mind. The person he loves appears in front of him in the form of melody, like a fixed thought and a lingering theme, which will be heard wherever he goes. "
In Berlioz's original work, only the last two movements are real "fantasy", which is related to the dream caused by opium. His interest in opium dreams came from reading De Quincy's translation of De Miaosai's Confessions of an English Opium smoker. But he himself has never used opium except for medical and stimulating purposes. The title of the first movement is "Fantasy, Passion";
"At first, he recalled the suffering of his soul, the catharsis of his passion, the inexplicable joy and sadness before he met the person he loved; Then, she suddenly aroused volcanic love in his heart, aroused his ecstasy, aroused his jealousy anger, aroused his enduring tenderness, and aroused the comfort he got from religion. "
The slow introduction of the movement appropriately expresses the artist's early emotions (C minor). The introduction is a piece of music he composed for florian's "I gave up for Jamaican when I was young". Violin with weak voice tells the fresh and youthful passion, and the use of harmony and orchestration is very unique and skillful. The musical idea in this introduction alone is enough to form a complete symphony. People may say that chateaubriand's vague passion would not be so imaginative elsewhere. People don't want to enter Allegro, but the fixed music has no accompaniment except the flickering of some irregular bass strings, which is strongly expressed on the violin and the first flute. The passionate Legato and the stubborn contrast are carefully choreographed. Although the melody itself may not be praised as beautiful music, the ups and downs of phrases, intense expression marks and unconsciously strengthened chromatic scales are all in line with his intention. This fixed idea appeared in the 1828 Rome Prize Chorus (Flerminie), but this melody was probably formed under the direct influence of Miss Smithsonian last autumn:
There is little similarity between the musical form of this movement and the classical vuvuzela form. Berlioz is more concerned with the development of music theme according to his own requirements, rather than forcing music to be bound by form. The following is a repeated presentation without the second theme, only the subsidiary theme that goes to E minor:
There is a reproductive department here, but it is hardly any form of development. There are a series of endings, which occupy almost half of the movement. Berlioz is eager to give people the impression that melody fragments, especially those based on the first six sounds of fixed musical ideas, do not need systematic discussion and scrutiny, unlike a fixed face, which makes people feel its existence and change: they are masters rather than victims in the development of music. Its framework is loosely embedded in many places in the movement, but Schumann affirmed its rational unity and strict skill training. In Schumann's groundbreaking symphony criticism, the phrase "although the work obviously has no certain form ..." did appear twice, but each time he pointed out his originality and sense of order in music, instead of following the recognized formal standards. There are many ingenious pens with real inspiration, the most memorable of which is the oboe theme, which seems to be like phosphogypsum rising from the rumble of fixed musical ideas; This is a strong return to the trumpet melody in C major, not (to be honest) a religious chord that brings the movement to a successful conclusion. The second movement "One Ball" is crystal clear in both drama performance and music, and so is the orchestration. It uses two harps, no bassoon, only an oboe. Dance music is deliberately concise and easy to understand, which is why Berlioz changes his accompaniment every time he reappears. The gentle and elegant theme is played by the violin (A major). In the second theme, we can see more obvious characters, whose shapes, like music scores, are full of the meaning of pushing words:
When a fixed musical idea appeared, the artist suddenly realized her existence. This sudden consciousness interrupted all attention to dance music, the key suddenly changed (F major), and the melody spread gracefully on flute and oboe. Gradually returned to the waltz, after the second reproduction of the fixed musical concept-this time more independent-Berlioz accelerated the rhythm of music, and all the instruments present were busy playing (centered on the first theme), which pushed it to a happy ending. The fourth movement is "Supply March". Before this chapter, Berlioz's imagination was still living in a world of melancholy and longing, and now it has fallen into the abyss of death. The charm of death and fear, the terrible power of supernatural things occupy everything, and the tones of Beethoven and Gluck are far behind. Music has never boldly entered this strange field before. The artist dreamed that he killed his beloved, and he was sentenced to death and put on the execution ground.
"The parade marched with the sound of the March. Music is sometimes gloomy and ominous, and sometimes brilliant and grand. At the same time, there is a heavy sound of footsteps running through the noise. Finally, the fixed music reappears for a moment, as if the last memory of love before decapitation. "
March of Death is the earliest and most vivid of Berlioz's March, which is selected from the unfinished opera The Judge of the Secret Court. At that time, this March could not have the imagination of "Death March". French horn, double bass, two pairs of timpani, harsh and ruthless rhythm, constitute a horrible picture. The cello and bass play a completely powerless descending scale, which seems to be a theme and enhances the nightmare. After the compound bar line, the power of the March is enhanced: people hear the killing desire of the crowd in the rough continuous sound of the trombone and the roaring string sound, and a continuous interlude rhythm leads to the complete juxtaposition of the chords in G minor (string) and D major (wind), reaching the extreme of terror and mental madness. As the last memory, the tension expressed by the fixed music played by clarinet was relieved by the falling straw cutter and a series of bloody major chords. The last movement: the night dream of the witch Sabbat (Songe d'une nuit de sabbat). In "Dearm of the Witch Sabbath", the artist sees himself on one side of the grave, and sees a group of ghosts, monsters and creepy demonic animals. Imagination dominates, the more bizarre the idea, the stronger the description effect. Unreasonability and strangeness have become the source of music effectiveness, at least in the introduction paragraphs of the movement, so the effect of Beloved's Arrival-the distortion and strangeness on the clarinet in E flat major, this time adds some orderly appearance to the music, rather than disturbing it. The direct impression is chaotic scenes and a lot of ugly and rough human figures, just like the opening ceremony of an evil and dark religious ceremony.
When the bell rang, Bassoon and orpheus Clyde (Berlioz knew how to make the worst noise) burst into the "Song of Judgment Day", and the ceremony was under way. Followed by the devil's round dance, not just witches, but a "demonic carnival" expressed by neurotic fugue. At this time, Berlioz's inner musician took over. When the "Song of Judgment Day" denounced the reckless and swift dance whirlwind, the music of victory showed that the theme was developed and reproduced in the chromatic scale. Berlioz always prepares something for his ending. They rushed to the finish line with perseverance. This also shows new ideas. Haw's bowstring and vibrato are followed by chromatic and unrestrained wind music. How can listeners not hold their breath once they realize that a strong bass will suddenly strike? Finally, add all the instruments, go to C major, play violent chords, and the whole song ends. The last chord of the symphony does not have the rumble of the timpani, so that the tune can wait for the arrival of sharp brass music in C major without hindrance.
Berlioz has found a new way in any aspect of symphony, such as the structural design of five movements, the unconventional design of each movement, the use of semi-autobiographical titles, the magical transformation of spiritual image into sound, the ingenious use of musical instrument talent methods, and the obvious modern concept of music. His symphonies are music full of irresistible youthful vitality, music with wild ideas and music with innate intuition. Berlioz developed orchestral music in a completely revolutionary way: he not only asked for two harps, an English clarinet, an E-flat clarinet, two orpheus Clydes, four-sided timpani and a string of percussion instruments, but also asked each instrument to accomplish things that he had never dreamed of before; He used a single voice from a purely practical point of view. He skillfully combined timbre, range and dynamics to create an orchestral sound different from classical masters.
There is a self-evident truth in the history of music, that is, those who take decisive steps are always geniuses rather than fanatical inventors. Fantasia is important not only because it has made a great breakthrough in the unexplored field of symphony, but also because it reveals a brand-new instrumental language. Its real value is that it can convey Berlioz's passion and make people feel its diverse imagination every time they hear it.