Berlioz first visited London between November 1847 and July 1848. He had come on an invitation by the French-born director of the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, Louis-Antoine Jullien. This page presents the text of a short biographical article on Berlioz in the Illustrated London News on 12 February 1848, published in the wake of Berlioz’s first concert of his own works in London, which took place at the Drury Lane Theatre a few days earlier on the 7th of February. Though the article is not signed it is very probably by Charles Gruneisen, a writer and critic established in London who was already friendly with Berlioz before the composer first came to London (he accompanied Berlioz on his journey to London in November 1847). The text of the article and the accompanying image have been scanned from our copy of the issue of 12 February 1848 of the Illustrated London News.
The same issue of the ILN also contains a review of the concert on 9 February, which is reproduced on a separate page under the title A concert in February 1848; the review is also very probably by Charles Gruneisen.
The Hector Berlioz Website was created by Monir Tayeb and Michel Austin on 18 July 1997; this page created on 1 April 2006.
© Monir Tayeb and Michel Austin. All rights of reproduction reserved.
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