brunswick
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Even before his departure in December 1842 on his first trip to Germany Berlioz included Brunswick (Braunschweig) among his intended destinations (CG no. 791). Although he did not know anyone there and was ignorant of local conditions, as he says in the Memoirs (Travels to Germany I, Letter 6), the city had previously been brought to his notice by one of its greatest musical assets – the Müller quartet, all of them brothers and members of a remarkable musical family settled in Brunswick since 1831. The quartet came to Paris in 1834 and again in 1837 to give concerts. Berlioz at the time commented admiringly on their excellence (Le Rénovateur, 23 February 1834; Critique musicale I p. 177) and writing to his friend Humbert Ferrand shortly after he mentioned ‘the incredible quartet of the Müller brothers, who play Beethoven in a way hitherto unknown to us’ (CG no. 384).
While his tour was progressing early in 1843 through Weimar, Dresden and Leipzig, Berlioz’s projected visit to Berlin was delayed, and on the advice of Meyerbeer Berlioz was persuaded to go to Brunswick instead: his arrival was awaited there, his overture King Lear had already won him supporters, and in addition the Müller brothers were in touch with him and offered their help (CG no. 816). The trip to Brunswick turned out to be one of the most rewarding of all Berlioz’s travels. Within a few days of his arrival Berlioz was enthusiastic about the rehearsals (CG no. 817, 6 March):
They have an outstanding orchestra, led by the four Müller brothers whose miraculous quartet you heard in Paris. I have just finished the first rehearsal, and the players have been warm and demonstrative in their applause, very much like the French.
A few days after the concert on 9 March Berlioz wrote to his father (CG no. 820):
I doubt I could obtain a greater success than what I achieved here. For a start the playing was marvellous, and the enthusiasm of both the public and the musicians exceeded all my dreams.
My scores of Romeo and the Requiem were crowned in the theatre; the Pilgrim’s March was encored; they also asked for a movement from Romeo to be repeated, but it was too long and too risky for me to agree to play it again [probably the Queen Mab scherzo]. After the concert the orchestra came to invite me to a grand dinner which it was offering with the leading amateur musicians of the town. It was a brilliant gathering. I was showered again with hurrahs in choral style (in the harmonious manner of the Germans), poems in praise, toasts, and crowns.
The theatre was full and the takings exceeded by 48 thalers the highest figure previously achieved.
A much fuller account of the rehearsals and the concert was given later by Berlioz in Travels to Germany I, Letter 6.
One of the most devoted supporters of Berlioz in Germany was Robert Griepenkerl (1810-1868), who taught German language and literature in Brunswick, and was in addition a music critic and francophile. Berlioz met him during his visit and started a lasting correspondence with him. Griepenkerl was unfailingly supportive: on 6 May 1843 he made the trip to Hanover to hear a concert conducted by Berlioz; in November 1852 he went to see Berlioz in Weimar and attend a performance of Benvenuto Cellini there; in 1853 he helped to organise a concert by Berlioz in Bremen. On the occasion of Berlioz’s visit in 1843 Griepenkerl published an influential pamphlet in praise of Berlioz and his music, Ritter Berlioz in Braunschweig (the title may be rendered as ‘Sir Hector in Brunswick’); it was written in response to a critical article that had appeared in a Leipzig journal. A letter of Berlioz thanking Griepenkerl for his pamphlet is extant (CG no. 833, May 1843 [full text in vol. VIII]):
I have received the learned and sympathetic pamphlet you wrote about my compositions and my musical tendencies. A work such as this gives me confidence, and is all the more flattering as any reader can see from the opening lines that it emanates from a lofty spirit that is entirely free from prejudice. I believe no one until now has laid bare as you have done the causes of the ceaseless hostility of critics against me. Your chapter on honour is admirable, and, I think, entirely true. Your work has just been carefully translated into French for me, and I can now speak of it knowingly.
You will also find on this site a reproduction (with translation) of an autograph letter of Berlioz to Griepenkerl written in Leipzig and dated 13 December 1853 (CG no. 1659).
Berlioz’s second visit to Brunswick in April 1846 is less fully documented than the first. He does not refer to it in his Travels to Germany II or elsewhere in his Memoirs, and fewer of the extant letters deal with it. The visit came at the end of Berlioz’s tour, which had concentrated on Vienna, Prague and Pesth. From Prague Berlioz made arrangements for the projected concert with the devoted Griepenkerl (CG no. 1031, 1 April; cf. CG no. 1027), and added:
I thank you for all your efforts in propagating our ideas for music; time is the greatest of masters, and be assured that these ideas will triumph in northern Germany, and perhaps sooner than we expect. As for southern Germany the issue will soon be decided.
With the exception of the second movement of Harold, a regular favourite, the concert on 24 April comprised music that Berlioz had not played in Brunswick on his previous visit, and in particular the complete Fantastic Symphony. No detailed account survives of the concert, though back in Paris in early May Berlioz declared himself well satisfied to one of his correspondents in Prague (CG no. 1041):
My final concert in Germany, that in Brunswick, was altogether dazzling and very productive; the playing had admirable ensemble and nuance and left nothing to be desired.
After an interruption of several years Berlioz resumed his visits to Germany in 1852. In October of the following year he undertook a two month tour of northern Germany, starting with his beloved Brunswick. As he wrote to his sister Adèle two days before his departure (CG no. 1633), "I am looking forward to seeing again those excellent musicians from Brunswick and that enthusiastic public, which always gives me such a warm welcome". The two concerts on 22 and 25 October marked the high point of his popularity in Brunswick, and Berlioz was moved to write at length to the publisher Brandus the day after the second concert (CG no. 1636):
Here is as cold an account of my concerts in Brunswick as I am able to write.
Both took place before a capacity audience, and from the eve of the first all seats were sold out. The orchestral playing was of surpassing beauty and had a verve that cannot be fairly compared to that of any other orchestra known to me. This Brunswick orchestra is prodigious, when it wants to. And with me it always does. Actually my second concert was a benefit for the fund for the widows and orphans of the musicians, an institution that has been given my name. We played excerpts from the four acts of Faust, three pieces from Romeo and Juliet, the King Lear overture, Harold, the Repose of the Holy Family, very well sung in German by Schmetzer and which has won me every devout heart. The most effective pieces were the Ballet of the Will-o’-the Wisps from Faust, a piece that is not known in Paris, Marguerite’s Romance and the Feast at the Capulets from Romeo and Juliet. As for the Hungarian March, the chorus of the Sylphs and the Queen Mab scherzo, they never fail to bring the house down everywhere.
I was treated at the Deutsches Haus to a dinner for a hundred guests, in the presence of the Duke’s ministers, all the musicians, men of letters and leading amateurs of the city. Yesterday the orchestra came to present me with a silver-gilt conductor’s baton; Georg Müller offered it to me in the name of the musicians and in their presence.
The day before I had gone to a public park where is the hall of the Weissen Rosses [the White Horse] (forgive my German spelling) in which they give inexpensive popular concerts. They had announced on the programme my overture Roman Carnival, and I was curious to hear how it would go. The performance was excellent and very lively, unlike the way the piece is usually played. The public clamoured for an encore, and the overture was repeated. A few musicians then spotted me in the gallery, and the whole orchestra started to play fanfares, the women waved their handkerchiefs, and the men shouted their applause.
I was forced to get up and to greet the public from the top of the gallery, like a Tenor God from the height of his throne. In short the city of Brunswick is overwhelming me with attention; I have on my table all kinds of crowns I found yesterday evening on returning home, and which were placed after the concert on my stand in the orchestra.
Joachim came from Hanover and scored a magnificent success in yesterday’s concert when he played a violin concerto and a Paganini caprice; he has magnificent talent.
In a letter to Liszt the same day Berlioz writes: ‘The excellent Joachim came to play two pieces in yesterday’s concert and he scored a great success; I am delighted to have provided this good fortune to music lovers in Brunswick who did not know him’ (CG no. 1637).
It was during his stay in Brunswick in October 1853 that Berlioz made an excursion on foot to the Harz mountains to the south of the city (it will be recalled that Berlioz located the imaginary city of Euphonia, that was dedicated to the cult of music, "on the slopes of the Harz"). He was much impressed by the scenery, no doubt in part because of its connections with the Faust legend (it was in Brunswick in 1828 that the first performance of Part I of Goethe’s Faust took place). As Berlioz relates to his friend Humbert Ferrand the following month, in words that recall not coincidentally the Invocation to nature in the Damnation of Faust (CG no. 1648):
I thought a great deal about you three weeks ago, during an excursion I made on foot to the Harz mountains (the setting of the sabbath scene in Faust). I have never seen anything so beautiful; what mountains! what torrents! what rocks! These are the ruins of a world… I was looking for you and missed you on these poetic summits. I must admit that I was choking with emotion.
Also during the same stay Berlioz met the exceptionally engaging figure of Baron von Donop, the chamberlain to the Prince of Lippe-Detmold (CG no. 1650). Von Donop had made the trip from Detmold specially to hear Berlioz’s music; he proved to be one of the most devoted and perceptive of his German admirers (CG no. 2070), and took an active interest in Berlioz’s compositions which he knew in intimate detail. He was one of those who urged Berlioz to undertake the writing of The Trojans (CG nos. 2146, 2320) and kept an active correspondence with the composer till at least 1858 (CG nos. 1682, 1716, 1882, 2320).
Such was the success of the visit the previous October that Berlioz was invited to return once more. As he wrote at the time to his uncle Marmion from Brunswick (CG no. 1726):
I am here in answer to an invitation addressed to me by the Kapellmeister Karl Müller (the leader of the celebrated quartet). He is giving a concert next Saturday and I have promised to provide and conduct three pieces. All these people in Brunswick, players and music-lovers, have so often overwhelmed me with marks of esteem and displays of enthusiasm that I could not resist the pleasure of going out of my way to the Duchy of Brunswick.
Berlioz’s most significant contribution to the concert on 8 April was the first performance of the overture The Corsair in its revised version. Soon after Berlioz wrote to his friend J. W. Davison in London, the dedicatee of the overture (CG no. 1730):
We have just performed for the first time in Brunswick your overture to The Corsair, which went very well and made a great impact. With a large orchestra and a conductor with an iron grip to direct it, this piece has got to come across with a certain swagger.
The visit of 1854 was the last occasion on which Berlioz came to Brunswick. The following year the Müller quartet left the city. Berlioz’s correspondence with Griepenkerl continued till at least 1856 (CG no. 2090, in connection with Berlioz’s stay in Gotha), though it is probable that the end of the regular visits to Germany will have brought about a loss of momentum in Berlioz’s personal links with many of his German friends. But Griepenkerl’s name makes one final and belated appearance in Berlioz’s correspondence. In a letter of 12 March 1866, Louis Berlioz writes to his father (CG no. 3114):
I read yesterday a little book published in Brunswick and concerning a concert you gave in that city on 9 March 1843. The name of the author is Griepenkerl. I had never read this defence, and I found there some very interesting details.
1843
ca 1 March: Berlioz arrives in Brunswick, coming from Leipzig
9 March: concert conducted by Berlioz in the Ducal Theatre, including Harold in Italy
(with Karl Müller as solo viola), the Benvenuto
Cellini overture, the Feast at the Capulets and Queen Mab scherzo from Romeo
and Juliet,
the Reverie and caprice for violin and orchestra (played by Karl Müller),
Absence and La
belle voyageuse sung by Marie
Recio, and the Offertorium and Quaerens
me of the Requiem
ca 15 March: Berlioz departs for Hamburg
1846
21 April: Berlioz arrives in Brunswick, coming from Prague
24 April: concert conducted by Berlioz in the Ducal Theatre, including the
overture Carnaval romain, the boléro Zaïde (sung by Mme Fischer-Achten), the 2nd movement of Harold
in Italy, the song Le chasseur danois (sung by Fischer), and the complete
Fantastic Symphony
towards end of month: Berlioz departs for Paris
1853
14 October: Berlioz arrives in Brunswick from Paris
22 October: first concert conducted by Berlioz at the Ducal Theatre, including
excerpts from the Damnation of Faust, Romeo and Juliet, Harold
in Italy, and The Repose of the Holy Family from the Childhood of
Christ
22 or 23 October: dinner in honour of Berlioz at the Deutsches Haus
24 October: Berlioz hears a performance of the Roman Carnival overture
at a popular concert by a small orchestra; the work is encored
25 October: second concert conducted by Berlioz, including the King Lear
overture and Harold in Italy; the young Joseph Joachim came from Hanover
to perform a violin concerto and a Paganini caprice; the concert was for the
benefit of widows and orphans of musicians (the foundation was named named after
Berlioz). The conductor Georg Müller offered Berlioz an incrusted baton
28 October: Berlioz departs for Hanover
1854
2 April: Berlioz leaves Hanover for Brunswick
8 April: during a concert under Karl Müller in the Ducal Theatre Berlioz
conducts the first performance of the revised version of the overture The
Corsair (it
was never performed by Berlioz in France)
10 April: Berlioz arrives in Dresden coming from Brunswick
We are indebted to our friend Pepijn van Doesburg for much of the following information concerning the city of Brunswick and its buildings, and for the photos which are reproduced below.
Brunswick has suffered considerably from the ravages of
time and war: large parts of the old town were destroyed during World War II,
and almost nothing survives of the buildings associated with Berlioz’s visits.
Some streets are still lined by the original half-timbered houses and give an
idea of what the city must have looked like in Berlioz’s time.
The palace of the Duke of Brunswick (Braunschweiger Schloss)
This engraving is in the public domain.
Ölschlägern
Ölschlägern is not far from the Schlosspark were the palace
of the duke of Brunswick once stood.
The site of palace of the Duke of Brunswick
The palace of the Duke of Brunswick was damaged during World War II and finally sadly demolished in 1960. Today the place is occupied by the Schlosspark (Palace Park). In July 2003 the city council of Brunswick passed a resolution to construct an Early Childhood Education Centre in the Schlosspark. The building is to have a façade like the old Brunswick Palace (Braunschweiger Schloss), re-using some original material stored after the demolition. By September 2006 the reconstruction was in an advanced state.
The present Hagenmarkt, site of the theatre where Berlioz gave his concerts
In the Middle Ages the town consisted of several quarters,
each with its own local government (Altstadt, Hagen, Altewick, Neustadt and
Sack). In 1689/90, after Brunswick finally got its
central government, the former Rathaus ("town hall") and Gewandhaus
("cloth hall") of the Hagen quarter were converted into a theatre
by Landbaumeister Johann Balthasar Lauterbach. It was in this theatre that
Berlioz gave his Brunswick concerts on 9 March 1843, 24 April 1846, 22 and 25
October 1853 and 8 April 1854. The theatre closed in 1861, when it was replaced
by the new Staatstheater. It was subsequently demolished. The photo shows today’s
Hagenmarkt; the theatre was located at the spot where nowadays cars and tramways
circulate (foreground).
The Staatstheater, built in 1859-61, restored in 1945-48
The new Staatstheater, built in 1859-61 by architects Carl Wolf and Heinrich Ahlburg, replaced the old court theatre at the Hagenmarkt. It was restored in 1945-48, after damage in World War II. Berlioz never knew this building, as his last visit to Brunswick took place in 1854.
During Berlioz’s stay in 1853 a dinner in his honour was held at the Deutsches Haus (see above); he apparently stayed there during his visit the following April (CG no. 1725). There is a Ringhotel Deutsches Haus in Castle Square in Brunswick’s historic city centre, which was originally built as a guest house for Brunswick Castle. We have not yet been able to establish whether it is the same Deutsches Haus associated with Berlioz’s visits of 1853 and 1854.
Also in 1853 Berlioz attended a performance of the overture Roman Carnival at the hall of the White Horse (see above); we are uncertain about the location of this building and whether it is still extant.
The Berlioz in Brunswick page was created on 1 February 2005.
© 2005-2008 (unless otherwise stated) Michel Austin and Monir Tayeb for text; Pepijn van Doesburg for photos.
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