Introduction
The concert in Bordeaux
Illustrations
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IntroductionOver the years Berlioz received a number of invitations to give a concert in Bordeaux, but in the event it was only late in the day, in 1859, that he finally made the journey there. That concert was a success, but was not followed up with any further visits. This page collects the material on Berlioz’s relations with Bordeaux, most of which comes from his correspondence.
There is no mention of Bordeaux in Berlioz’s Memoirs, apart from a passing allusion to wine from the region. But the name of Bordeaux turns up a number of times in the composer’s feuilletons for the Journal des Débats, which show that Berlioz kept himself informed of the musical activities in the city. The earliest known reference is negative; near the end of a feuilleton of 1835 he writes:
Last year Beethoven was hissed in Bordeaux. It is true that on the banks of the river Garonne, when people go to a spectacle, they laugh, they chat and they opine, and they enjoy themselves for a while; as a result even a perfect performance of the Eroica symphony could not seem enjoyable to the Gascons.
Nearly 20 years later, a feuilleton of 1854 gives a much more positive impression:
The musical congress in Bordeaux, conducted and organised with the rarest intelligence and warm devotion by M. Mézerai, caused a great sensation. The exceptional magnificence of this festival demonstrates at once the interest taken in fine manifestations of art by the population of Bordeaux, and the musical resources that this city possesses. This is a happy omen for the future of music in the south of France, which up till now had allowed itself to be somewhat outpaced by the cities of the North [Berlioz is probably thinking here particularly of Lille].
The conductor mentioned is Costard de Mézeray (1810-1887), who was also a composer and singer. In 1843 he founded in Bordeaux the Société Sainte-Cécile, and in the same year became conductor of the Grand-Théâtre de Bordeaux (Critique Musicale vol. 8, p. 380 n. 50). Berlioz would be dealing with him later when he came to Bordeaux in 1859 (see below), but before then he had another occasion to sing his praises, in a feuilleton of 1858:
And now a few words on the French provinces. Fernand Cortez has just been staged in Bordeaux, with a splendour and care worthy of Spontini’s masterpiece. The chorus and orchestra, considerably enlarged, performed, it is said, with altogether exceptional verve under the able direction of M. Mézerai.
The concert in BordeauxIt was apparently in 1842 that Berlioz first thought of going to Bordeaux to give a concert, though this was not on his own initiative but in response to an invitation from the city. In a letter of 5 February to his sister Nancy Berlioz writes (Correspondance Générale no. 765, hereafter CG for short):
[…] I am being invited to Bordeaux to organise and direct a Festival in September. A special hall is to be constructed for the purpose, there will be six hundred performers, and the city will contribute 30,000 francs. So far I have only received an unofficial approach and I await the official letter. This is probably going to come off, so on to the Lacrymosa, the great cataclysm of the Requiem, and the finale of Romeo and Juliet! With four hundred voices one can give a passable rendering of those songs. […]
Nothing further is heard of the project – few letters of Berlioz survive for this period – and Berlioz had more important musical plans in mind at the time. In September he was off to Brussels with Marie Recio on an exploratory visit to prepare the ground for his first large-scale trip to Germany which he had been thinking of for a long time.
Three years later Berlioz was considering a more extended visit to Bordeaux, and mentions the plan in separate letters to each of his sisters on the same day (6 June 1845). Here again the planned concerts were in response to an invitation from Bordeaux (it is not known from whom exactly), and it is noticeable how wary Berlioz was of the quality of music-making he could expect there; he had evidently not yet revised the unfavourable opinion of music-making in Bordeaux expressed in his 1835 feuilleton. He writes to Adèle (CG no. 969; cf. 968 more briefly to Nancy):
[…] I am going to Bordeaux to give concerts while waiting for something better to turn up; I am led to expect some positive result from the curiosity of the southerners. But I am petrified at the thought of their orchestras and of all the sweat they are going to cause me given the present heat. I am finding it increasingly difficult to put up with bad music. I will be away for a month at most. […]
In both letters Berlioz curiously fails to mention that he had already decided to accept an offer to visit Marseille in June, a visit which was followed by one to Lyon in July which gave him the opportunity to see his father again at La Côte-Saint-André. In the event the Bordeaux project was postponed till after his trip in August to the Beethoven celebrations in Bonn, though Berlioz kept planning for it. George Hainl, his friend the conductor in Lyon, made soundings in Bordeaux on his behalf but by early August had not received any answer (CG nos. 987 and 989). On the recommendation of some friends Berlioz was moved to approach himself a music dealer in Bordeaux (CG no. 989 [full text in vol. VIII]; 7 August):
[…] I am leaving today for Bonn where I will be staying until the 18th. My intention is then to leave for Bordeaux where I would like to give a concert; I am writing to ask you to smooth my path by having my arrival announced for the 24th or 25th and by asking the director of the theatre or his representative whether he is prepared to accept the conditions which the directors of Marseille and Lyon recently set for me. These are: the sharing of the receipts after deducting 300 fr of expenses for the theatre, and the sharing of the special costs such as those for additional musicians, posters and programmes. He would make available to me the use of his orchestra and chorus at no charge; I would bring all the music and conduct the rehearsals and the performance. The price of tickets should be somewhat increased.
If your commitments allow you, could you please arrange this matter with the administration […]. M. George Hainl wrote from Lyon about this to the conductor of the theatre, and as he received no reply I find myself obliged to be so indiscreet as to ask you for this service. […]
As in 1842 nothing came of this, and Berlioz had more important priorities: in the autumn of 1845 and after his return from Bonn, he started composing one of his greatest works, the Damnation of Faust and in late October was off to Vienna at the start of his second major trip to Germany.
In 1852 Berlioz received another proposal to give concerts in Bordeaux in late February, but the project failed again to materialise (briefly mentioned in CG nos. 1444 [4 February] and 1454 [22 February], both to Liszt). Instead Berlioz soon departed to London where he gave a major series of six concerts between March and June. In 1856 yet another projected visit did not come off (brief allusion in CG no. 2130 [23 May]).
It was only years later, in 1859, that Berlioz accepted yet another invitation from Bordeaux which this time was carried out despite his initial lack of enthusiasm: among many other worries his health was poor and he was struggling to get his new and greatest work the opera Les Troyens performed in Paris. On 13 April he writes to his sister Adèle (CG no. 2366; cf. also nos. 2364, 2368):
[…] At the beginning of June I will be leaving for Bordeaux; I have decided again to accept an invitation to go and conduct a concert there, always for financial reasons, because I find this a pain in the neck.
Baden-Baden is different, there at least I am involved in great art…… […]
France was unable to replicate the ideal conditions provided by Édouard Bénazet in Baden-Baden – one concert every summer over which Berlioz had complete control. The concert in Bordeaux was at the invitation of the Société de Sainte Cécile mentioned above; it was a charity concert in which Berlioz would conduct some of his own music – the second and third movements of Romeo and Juliet, the Flight to Egypt (part II of l’Enfance du Christ) and the Roman Carnival overture (CG no. 2368) – but other works were to be performed as well under the direction of Costard de Mézeray, the conductor of the Société of whom Berlioz had formed a very positive impression, according to his feuilletons of 1854 and 1858, though his letters are silent on this part of the concert. A letter of ca. early May probably addressed to Mézeray (according to CG) concerns the sending of orchestral parts for the Flight to Egypt and makes recommendations for the rehearsals which were conducted ahead of Berlioz’s arrival (CG no. 2372):
[…] I believe you will soon be starting your orchestral rehearsals. In this connection I urge you to select with care some good musicians for the percussion parts, otherwise we will cause chaos with the errors in rhythm that the cymbal, bass drum, tambourine, and other players inevitably make. And then bad musicians lack finesse in their playing and are only capable of producing a ridiculous noise.
This is very dangerous. […]
A letter of Berlioz dated 19 May to an unknown recipient requests a free railway pass for the trip to Bordeaux, on the grounds that the conditions offered by the Société were very modest (CG no. 2373). Berlioz left Paris on 5 June (CG no. 2371) and stayed in Bordeaux for just over a week (CG nos. 2368, 2378). The concert took place in the theatre on 8 June, which implies that Berlioz had only a few days to rehearse before the concert. The orchestra numbered 110 and the chorus 140 (CG no. 2377). The day after the concert a banquet was held in Berlioz’s honour. Berlioz was back in Paris on 12 June (CG nos. 2377-8). No letters survive from during his stay in Bordeaux, but on his return to told about the visit to friends and family. On 12 June he writes to his sister Adèle (CG no. 2378; cf. 2377 more briefly to Auguste Morel):
I am back from Bordeaux. A grand and fine performance in the theatre; a monumental success, crowns, decorations offered by the orchestra, before a vast audience, banquets, applause, curtain calls, in short everything that can be done to fête an artist. This festival took me only eight days and has at least brought me a thousand francs. But on coming back I am worried at not having received news from Louis… He should have arrived… I do not understand.
I am still unwell, but the southern air seems to have done me some good; perhaps also the warmth of this fine Bordeaux public and of the musicians has a great deal to do with it. […]
How are you coping with the anxieties of the war? For me it is a source of extreme worry and tension. Poor Mme Espinasse, my neighbour in Rue de Calais, was also my neighbour in Bordeaux when the préfet came to announce to her the death of her husband… it is terrible…
The war referred to is that between France and Austria which had just broken out and which for a while threatened to jeopardise the summer festival in Baden (cf. CG nos. 2379, 2380, 2383-4, 2386).
A few weeks later Berlioz writes to his brother in law Camille Pal (CG no. 2381, 3 July):
[…] I am still not very well. Nevertheless a trip I have just made to Bordeaux seems to have reinvigorated me a little. I had been invited to conduct some of my works in a Festival; everything went perfectly, the superb theatre was full to overflowing. I was applauded, called back, presented with a crown of gold and foliage, a banquet was held; in short I was fêted in every possible way, and the performance was very fine. […]
Berlioz never returned to Bordeaux subsequently, and the concert on 8 June 1859 was thus the only one he gave in that city, though a feuilleton of 1862 shows what a positive impression Berlioz had formed from his visit there:
Mme Rosa Escudier-Kastner, the celebrated and charming pianist [...] has just made a musical excursion to Bordeaux, of which the Bordeaux public, so warm and knowledgeable, will long preserve the memory.
One would like to believe that the Bordeaux public had preserved a similar memory of Berlioz’s 1859 concert.
Illustrations All the pictures displayed below have been scanned from early 20th-century postcards in our collection. © Monir Tayeb and Michel Austin. All rights of reproduction reserved.
The Grand Théâtre of Bordeaux was designed by the architect Victor Louis (1731-1800) and inaugurated on 17 April 1780. It is the oldest timber-framed opera house in Europe not to have burnt or required
rebuilding. In 1991 its interior was however restored to its original colours. Today the theatre is home to the Opéra National de Bordeaux.
The Hector Berlioz Website was created by Monir Tayeb and Michel
Austin on 18 July 1997;
Berlioz in Bordeaux page created on 11 December 2006. Revised and enlarged on 1 July 2023.
© Monir Tayeb Michel Austin for all the pictures and information on this page.
Copyright notice: The texts, photos, images and musical scores on all pages of this site are covered by UK Law and International Law. All rights of publication or reproduction of this material in any form, including Web page use, are reserved. Their use without our explicit permission is illegal.
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