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2019 | Classical
FLAC, Lossless | 7.94 Gb
Hector Berlioz, France’s greatest Romantic composer, died in Paris on 8 March 1869. Warner Classics is marking the 150th anniversary of his death with the release of the first-ever complete Berlioz edition. Looking to repeat the success of Warner Classics’ complete Debussy edition, released in 2017, the set becomes available in physical and digital formats on 1 February 2019.
Hector Berlioz: The Complete Works contains a wealth of milestone recordings. Carefully selected from the Warner Classics and Erato catalogues with some additions from Decca and Deutsche Grammophon, they span more than 60 years, from 1956 to 2018. Among them are: the multi-award winning 2017 recording of Les Troyens conducted by John Nelson; the Symphonie fantastique and Lélio conducted by Jean Martinon; Janet Baker singing Les Nuits d’été conducted by Sir John Barbirolli, and L’Enfance du Christ conducted by John Eliot Gardiner.
The edition also contains a number of world premiere recordings, most notably the surviving fragments of the unfinished opera La Nonne sanglante. Featuring leading French soprano Véronique Gens, these were recorded at their world premiere performance at the 2018 Berlioz Festival in La Côte-Saint-André, near Lyon. The edition offers a special bonus in the form of the two earliest recordings of Berlioz’s music, produced by Pathé at the beginning of 20th century: two of Didon’s arias from Les Troyens are sung by Marie Delna and Félia Litvinne, and for the very first time on CD the first ever recording of la Symphonie fantastique under Rhené-Baton’s baton, recorded in 1923.
Berlioz is the epitome of the Romantic composer, exemplifying the spirit which dominated the artistic world in the 19th century. He led an unconventional, hectic life, driven by his passions, and was an avid admirer of Beethoven, the father of Romanticism in music, and of such influential literary figures as Shakespeare, Goethe, Walter Scott, Lord Byron and Victor Hugo. Much of his music has an autobiographical element; his most famous work, the Symphonie fantastique (1830) was inspired by his obsessive love for the British actress Harriet Smithson, whom he eventually married.
His works are astonishing for their ambition, originality and colour. He was a transformative force in orchestration and often used huge forces – such as 16 timpani in his Grande Messe des Morts and six harps in Les Troyens. While each of his major works has a distinctive poetry and atmosphere, it is perhaps Les Troyens, an opera of epic proportions, that best sums up his richly diverse artistic personality.
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