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Advisor: Mark Evan Bonds

Dissertation Title: Berlioz’s `Dramatic Symphony’: Genre and Meaning in Roméo et Juliette

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Dissertation Abstract:

“The genre of this work will surely not be misunderstood. Although voices are frequently used, it is neither a concert opera, nor a cantata, but a symphony with choruses.” Despite the ironic opening gambit of Hector Berlioz’s preface to the 1858 vocal score of his Roméo et Juliette symphony, it is precisely the genre of the work that music critics and scholars have so consistently misunderstood since its première in November 1839. The mixture of genres within the context of Berlioz’s “dramatic symphony” posed seemingly insurmountable problems for contemporary critics. Even today no one has attempted to explain Berlioz’s aesthetic rationale for including choral recitative, instrumental and choral fugues, an air, a funeral march, a programmatic scherzo, an instrumental adagio, and an operatic finale in one symphony. Instead of attempting to make sense of the evident problems the work’s generic mixture poses for a symphony, scholars have tended to read Roméo et Juliette almost exclusively in the context of French opera, with the effect that both Berlioz’s symphonic masterpiece and his skill as a composer have been misunderstood and, consequently, undervalued. 

I propose that there is greater meaning to the mixture of genres in Roméo et Juliette and that each of the genres represented in this symphony has a meaning in the context of the contemporary debate on musical expression. A systematic investigation of the interactions of forms and performing forces in this mixture of genres will shed light on an array of aesthetic, philosophical, and orchestrational issues at work in Berlioz’s music. When read as a response to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, whose generic mixture and formal arrangement puzzled contemporary critics and continues to puzzle music scholars, the generic mixture in Roméo et Juliette assumes renewed importance in musical culture. By taking into consideration the broader context of contemporary music criticism and writings on musical expression (including Berlioz’s own), my investigation of the aesthetic and cultural implications of the different genres at work in Roméo et Juliette will contribute to the emerging picture of early nineteenth-century Parisian musical culture. The questions of musical form that this symphony raises also have implications that extend well beyond Berlioz’s sphere in France to his German contemporaries. In comparing the music and writings of Berlioz, Liszt, and Wagner that come in the wake of Roméo et Juliette, I aim to illuminate paths of influence not yet fully explored, thus filling out the picture of Berlioz’s influence on the New German School and contributing to the fascinating web of interactions between nineteenth-century French and German musical spheres. 

 

Dr. Hambrick leads a varied career as a poet, radio announcer, and author. Her poetry has received many awards and been published in numerous literary magazines, as well as in collected volumes. In addition, she is the midday host of the program Classical 101 on WOSU Public Media, where she also works as a producer and blogger.