# BERLIOZ: Harold vs Fantastique?



## DavidMahler

Which one is your preference between the two?


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## Crudblud

Definitely Harold. Bear in mind that I'm not really a Berlioz fan; to me much of his work comes across as very light even when depicting supposedly terrible scenes as in the Symphonie Fantastique.


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## Il_Penseroso

I love Berlioz, I love all of his works, vocal and orchestral, and so can't decide which one is my preference !


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## ComposerOfAvantGarde

My favourite viola player, my favourite conductor _and_ my favourite piece by Berlioz! What a show!


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## Sid James

I think the main thing they have in common is their autobiographical nature. Otherwise, it's really like comparing chalk and cheese, or apples and oranges, these kinds of cliched analogies. Other than them being both innovative works and all that. I especially like the very wierd counterpoint that comes in their final movements.

As for which I like more, I think I've heard_ Symphonie Fantastique _too many times, esp. in my youth, so now it is like quite cliche for me. So I am happy to choose_ Harold in Italy_, it is still relatively fresh for me, I just got to know it well since getting it on cd a few years back.

But they are both masterpieces, showing the emotions and life of the composer quite directly - with a fair hint of imagination thrown in, this is Berlioz after all!...


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## jalex

_Fantastique_ is overall a little stronger I think, more compelling as a whole. Nothing in Harold matches the last movement of Fantasique IMO. However there's something to be said for the (slightly) more understated nature of Harold; in purely musical terms it's a bit more subtle and sophisticated than in Fantastique, and more attention is paid to details of shading than the predominantly raw excitement of SF (that's not to say Harold _isn't_ exciting; the last movement is as thrilling a piece of orchestral music as anything written up to that time by anyone not named Beethoven).

I find it difficult to understand the huge popularity discrepancy though; SF clocked in right near the top of the Great Symphonies project, but Harold (and Romeo) placed miserably down at about 125, behind a whole host of (IMO) less accomplished works. Both looks like they would fit more comfortably at around the 50 mark, after most of the 'huge' symphonies no doubt but certainly good candidates for 'best of the rest'.


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## Guest

Except of course for neither of them being autobiographical!

They are both nice pieces, of course, neither with quite the scope or unconventionality of _Roméo et Juliette._

But why would anyone want to choose between them, anyway? And even if you could, why would you?


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## Sid James

^^Not literally autobiographical. You must know this, it's fairly basic to intermediate stuff._ Symphonie Fantastique _to do with the Irish actress he fell in love with, all that kind of stuff, and _Harold in Italy _having more do do with his travels in Italy than the source material by Byron.

You misrepresent history, which is what I trained in. I just don't understand because you obviously have a good deal of experience with classical music.

It's good to think outside of the box, but when you think too far out, you end up not talking much sense at all...


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## GoneBaroque

Their style is sufficiently different that such a comparison would be irrelevant. they are each masterpieces in their own way.


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## itywltmt

The question was "which one do I like more" and the answer was easy - SF all the way!

Harold is a fine work too, but SF was so revolutionary and its ending so much more awesome it just eclipses not only Harold, but probably everything else he wrote afterwards...


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## jalex

itywltmt said:


> TSF was so revolutionary and its ending so much more awesome it just eclipses not only Harold, *but probably everything else he wrote afterwards...*


_Les Troyens_,the _Grande Messe des Mortes_ and _Romeo et Juliette_ are certainly not eclipsed by it - I'd argue that those three are his finest works.


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## itywltmt

Don't disagree - maybe my choice of words was bad...

I don't think he worte anything as "groundbreaking" after SF. The works you mention are indeed very strong - though I find R&J very good "in parts" but not as a whole, especially when compared to other R&J adaptations. Les Troyens is Wganerian in scope (and length...) and his Requiem is indeed very strong.

But none of them have the same "revolutionnary" flavour to them - the idea of an _idee-fixe _symphony was new and save works by Liszt, nothing from that time period exploited the idea with the same verve.


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## elgar's ghost

I like them both as much as each other but would say that in terms of significance Sf edges HeI out as it sounds so ahead of its time - it's hard to believe that the pre-revision version of this quintessentially Romantic work was written as early as 1830 when the era of Romantic music was still relatively in its infancy. It might be a lofty statement but I think Sf was as far-reaching for orchestral music as Beethoven's late quartets were for chamber output.


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## Guest

Sid James said:


> ^^Not literally autobiographical. You must know this, it's fairly basic to intermediate stuff._ Symphonie Fantastique _to do with the Irish actress he fell in love with, all that kind of stuff, and _Harold in Italy _having more do do with his travels in Italy than the source material by Byron.


Fairly basic misrepresentations, that is.

Here is Jacques Barzun on "the common belief that Berlioz wrote the symphony about himself and Harriet Smithson."

"The striking thing is the total lack of connection between Berlioz' relations with the actress and the scenes he chose for his story: he had never taken her to a ball, never been with her in the country--much less at a public execution: he hardly knew her except across the footlights." (They didn't meet face to face until years later.)

Not to mention that he was engaged to Camile Moke at the time.

The symphony "came from his life only in the generalized sense that all works of the mind distill the experience of the creator."

Berlioz himself wrote that he "did not write the witches' sabbath with Harriet in mind." Of course, one is free to disregard what a creator writes about his own creations; sometimes one is almost obliged to do so! But Berlioz seems to have had no agenda to pursue by lying about his motives.

He was interested then and always, with the music, not the story, with his invention of the idee fixe as a way of unifying a large-scale work (same is true for _Harold_), and with the countless other technical innovations he introduced in this exceptional work.

It would be salutary for everyone who knows this work to substitute for the infamous story Robert Schumann's masterful essay on it, which he wrote having never heard the piece and working from only a piano score!!

(Berlioz in writing the program was working in an established tradition of program writing, and in never doing such a thing again, was instrumental (as it were) in breaking with the program tradition.)

Same for _Harold._ He was concerned with carrying on and with adding to the Beethovenian tradition of musical expressivity.

These are first and foremost pieces of music, not autobiographical accounts (or even impressions) of his life. He did that, too, and it's called the _Memoirs._


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## Sid James

I'm not responding to what's above, or commenting, but will add my own things here, for what they're worth.

Both works have some autobiographical element, as many of Berlioz's works do. Not necessarily literally, but in terms of what was going on in his life, his character, and the times in which he lived.

The_* Symphonie Fantastique*_ was titled_ Episode in the Life of an ARtist_. He was the artist (composer), telling his own story in a way, also relating to the culture of his time. Eg. the ballroom scene and the part with the guillotine would have been relevant to people then. Anyway, I think people here know these things already.

As for _*Harold in Italy*_, it has little to do with Bryon's source, more a journal of Berlioz's impressions of travelling in that country. Eg. he captures the drone of a bagpipe in one of the parts, as well as a guy serenading his lover in another (the Italians love to sing, esp. love songs!), and also musical representation of bells ringing, which is a feature of many Italian towns.

The _idee fixe_ is treated differently in the two works. In the first, it is integrated fully into the work, being a symphony, the whole orchestra takes this main theme on a ride through various guises and settings. But in Harold in Italy, which is more like a concerto, the viola soloist plays his _idee fixe_ while the orchestral backdrop constantly changes. It is like Berlioz is the viola travelling through Italy, going through various regions imaged by the orchestra...


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## DavidMahler

Harold all the way here


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## NightHawk

I really do like 'Harold' better, but honestly, I can hardly stand to hear 'Fantastique' anymore. The first movement is always beautiful to me but is usually as far as I get. I've tried and tried with an expensive recording of Romeo and Juliet with Levine and Berlin and just loathe the early choral parts (and I love choral music!) and I've not given the rest of it a fair listen. I have the monumental Les Troyens and admire parts and really do not like others - for me, my personal opinion here, Berlioz has this 'other voice' that comes out in most of his compositions and it is cloying and trite. My very favorite work of Berlioz that is unblemished to my ear is 'L'nuits d'ete' and for it I recognize his genius.


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## MrCello

<3 Witch's Sabbath

So I'd have to go with Symphonie Fantastique.


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## EarthBoundRules

Both are incredible masterpieces. _Fantastique_ is more wildly exciting and unique, while _Harold_ has a more pastoral feeling to it and plays it safer. However, the climactic moments of _Harold_ don't capture me like those from _Fantastique_, although the tender moments in _Harold_ like the second movement are very beautiful. Plus, _Fantastique_ is much more nostalgic for me, so it gets my vote.


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## clavichorder

Almost an impossible contest for me, but like another poster said, Harold is more fresh for me and thus since I'm just discovering it, it gets my vote. There is something really really nice about it.


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## Richannes Wrahms

There is a certain 'lack of freshness' in Harold en Italie that makes me prefer the Fantastique. Although, that kind of heaviness is somewhat characteristic of Berlioz.


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## Ivanbeeth

I prefer the Fantastique. Harold's middle movements do nothing emotionally for me, whereas after the raw love expression of the Fantastique's first we still have the symphony's emotional core waiting in the scène aux champs. Also, Harold's finale is pure energy, whereas in the Fantastique's finale, albeit we also hear an orgy, the dies irae makes it tragic, taking the symphony somewhere further.


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