Berlioz in London
Theatre Royal Drury Lane
The Theatre Royal Drury Lane was first built in 1663; subsequently it was destroyed by fire or pulled down on several occasions and went through three further reincarnations. The fourth and present building, which is the one Berlioz knew, was designed by Wyatt and opened on 10 October 1812. It is situated in the West End of London; its current repertoire consists almost entirely of musicals and it no longer stages operas. The last opera heard there was probably in winter 1958 when Gorlinsky gave a two-month season of Italian operas.
Berlioz’s first visit to London, between November 1847 and July 1848, was the longest of his five visits. He came on an invitation by the French-born director of the Drury Lane Theatre, Louis-Antoine Jullien (known simply as Jullien). Berlioz was engaged to conduct concerts and the orchestra of the Grand English Opera which Jullien had in mind to establish at the Royal Theatre. At the time the engagement offered him a chance to improve his financial situation, a chance that Paris had denied him. Jullien, as Berlioz wrote in his Memoirs (chapter 57), had "hired an outstanding orchestra, a first rate chorus, and a fairly decent collection of singers". At first everything looked very promising, and Berlioz’s letters to his friends and relatives at the time reflect his excitement and optimism. On 10 November 1847 he writes to the cellist Tajan-Rogé (Correspondance générale no. 1135, hereafter abbreviated to CG):
You do not have a clear idea of my life in this dreadful city [Paris], which claims to be the artistic centre of the world. I have at last escaped from it. Here I am in England with an independent position, from the financial point of view, such that I had not dared to aspire to. My task is to conduct the orchestra of the Grand English Opera house which will open in Drury Lane in a month; I am also hired to give four concerts composed exclusively of my works, and finally to write a three act opera intended for the 1848 season. […] Jullien, the director, is a man of boldness and intelligence who knows London and the English better than anyone else. He has already made his fortune and has got it into his head to make mine. I am letting him go ahead, since to achieve this goal he proposes to rely exclusively on methods that satisfy art and good taste.
The Drury Lane season opened with Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor on 6 December under Berlioz’s baton and was a great success; on his entry to the orchestra pit, the audience gave him a superb reception and many numbers were encored.
However, the consequences of Jullien’s mismanagement of the artistic and financial affairs of the theatre soon became apparent. By mid-January 1848 he had lost a great deal of money and his credit in London. Berlioz, and other musicians, had not been paid at all even though, as he wrote to his friend Auguste Morel (CG no. 1162, 14 January):
I am working here like a horse in a mill, rehearsing every day from noon to 4 o’clock and conducting operas in the evening from 7 till 10.
He carried on his work at the theatre until the end of its three-month season, which included on 7 February the first of four concerts devoted entirely to his music, featuring Le Carnaval romain, Le jeune pâtre breton, Harold en Italie, the first two parts of La Damnation de Faust, and excerpts from Benvenuto Cellini, the Requiem and the Symphonie funèbre et triomphale. The concert was well received, as he wrote to Morel on 12 February (CG no. 1173):
My music has caught on the English public like a trail of gunpowder, and I was called back after the concert […] anybody who is anything in London musical life was at Drury Lane that evening, and the majority of musicians of any worth came to congratulate me after the concert at the theatre. There were not expecting anything of the kind; they thought my music was going to be diabolical, incomprehensible, harsh and without charm […].
(See also a contemporary review and an article on Berlioz, both published in the Illustrated London News.)
By April Jullien had been declared bankrupt and was imprisoned; Berlioz had until then stayed in his house at 76 Harley Street, but moved on 20 April to 26 Osnaburgh Street, Regent’s Park. A few days later he explained in a letter to Morel (CG no. 1191, 24 April):
I have had to leave Jullien’s house four days ago, as a new seizure had been carried out in the Queen’s name for the queen-tax that he had not paid.
Freed from contractual obligations, Berlioz gave a concert at Hanover Square Rooms on 29 June a fortnight before leaving for Paris.
In 1848, while Berlioz was in London, the 1848 revolution took place in France (February), and he started writing his Memoirs (21 March 1848). In the preface he wrote: "From the moment I have been living there, England has extended to me a generous and cordial hospitality". In Chapter 4, he breaks off the Memoirs’ past-tense narrative, and in a paragraph dated 12 July 1848, the eve of his departure for Paris, he writes:
I am now leaving for the sad country which is still called France, and which is my country after all. I am going to find out how an artist can make a living there, or how long it takes for him to die, amidst the ruins under which the flower of art is crushed and buried. Farewell England!
All the modern photos reproduced on this page were taken by
Michel Austin; other pictures have been scanned from engravings, prints and
books in our own collection. © Monir Tayeb and Michel Austin.
All rights of reproduction reserved.
The Theatre Royal Drury Lane in 2002
This pub, situated opposite the main entrance of the Theatre Royal across the small square, was built long before the theatre; Berlioz could have had a drink or two there.
The left side of the Theatre where the stage door is located
Another view of the above
The Theatre Royal Drury Lane – Stage door
The interior of the Theatre Royal Drury Lane in 1812
This engraving was published in La
Belle assemblée, volume vi (supplement), in 1813. The theatre had been opened in 1812.
The Theatre Royal Drury Lane in 1821
The Theatre Royal Drury Lane in 1850
A copy of this engraving is in the library of the Paris Opera.
Drury Lane at night
The original painting in this print is by G H Powell (1876-1934).
© 2002-2008 (unless otherwise stated) Michel Austin and Monir Tayeb for all the pictures and information on this page.
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