Berlioz in London
Theatre Royal Covent Garden
In 1853 Berlioz was invited back to London by Frederick Gye, the director of Covent Garden, to stage his Benvenuto Cellini at the opera house in Covent Garden (now the Royal Opera House). The opera had just been successfully revived in Weimar by Liszt in 1852, and it seemed likely that the work, which had failed disastrously at the Paris Opéra in 1838, was set to enjoy a new life.
Since its establishment in the 18th century the building has changed hands between various opera companies and also been rebuilt or redecorated a number of times. At the time Berlioz was in London for the Cellini performance the building was in its second reincarnation and had been occupied by the Royal Italian Opera since 1847. The company took up the lease and the architect Albano was engaged to make drastic structural alterations to turn the auditorium into the traditional Italian horseshoe-style opera house. The second Theatre Royal, Covent Garden, thus became the Royal Italian Opera, Covent Garden. It opened on 6 April 1847 with Rossini’s Semiramide, conducted by Costa. Its repertoire consisted largely of Italian works and the foreign operas which were staged had to be performed in Italian. Berlioz’s Cellini was translated into Italian too. The building Berlioz knew was burnt down in 1856. The third and present building was designed by Edward Barry and opened in 1858. In the mid-1990s it underwent extensive refurbishment and restorations.
In his correspondence Berlioz describes in graphic detail the disastrous single performance of Benvenuto Cellini on Saturday 25 June 1853 at Covent Garden. Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and the blind King and the Queen of Hanover, were present.
The rehearsals had all gone very well and Berlioz was very pleased with his Cellini (Tamberlick), Teresa (Madame Jullienne) and Ascanio (Madame Didiée). However, on the night a claque of Italian supporters in the audience were determined to ruin the performance. Here is Berlioz describing the event in a letter dated 27 June to his staunch supporter Armand Bertin, the editor and proprietor of the influential Journal des Débats (Correspondance générale no. 1608, hereafter abbreviated to CG):
Yesterday Benvenuto fell at Covent Garden exactly as in Paris. The difference is that the opposition showed its hand in advance and so its plan was discovered. A society of Italians had organised themselves as early as last Thursday to bring the opera down; they even booed the overture to the Carnaval romain during its performance. Several pieces were nevertheless encored, among them the arias of Fieramosca and Ascanio, and the first overture, though because of its length I decided not to play it again. See the article in The Times, which is not an analysis of the work but a fairly accurate account of the evening. [...] That same evening I withdrew the work, as I did not want to expose myself to the continuation of this Italian hostility, nor to that directed against Covent Garden by the people from Her Majesty’s Theatre who have lost their jobs because of Lumley’s bankruptcy, for which M. Gye is responsible.
And in another letter on the same day to the publisher Gemmy Brandus, Berlioz writes (CG no. 1609):
A formidable Italian army, organised for the last two weeks (though nobody had dared to warn me), came to cause mayhem during the whole evening of the 1st performance of Benvenuto. The actors were booed before they had even opened their mouth and the Carnaval romain overture was booed during its performance. [...] I am told that the Italian cabal intends to persevere with even greater fury if I carry on. They are clamouring that Covent Garden is being invaded by foreigners. Because Mme Jullienne is French, Mme Didiée is French, Tagliafico is French, Zelger is Belgian, Formé is German, Stigelli is German, and they are appearing in a Frenchman’s opera. They have also enlisted the support of Lumley’s people, who have been dispossessed by Gye of Her Majesty’s Theatre.
Once back in Paris, Berlioz wrote on 10 July a detailed letter to Liszt, a staunch champion of Benvenuto Cellini, about the event, and in it he also mentioned the musicians’ gesture of sympathy (CG no. 1617):
The artists of Covent Garden and of the New Philharmonic Society wanted to give me a proof of sympathy on this occasion. Some 220 got together to organise at no cost a vast concert at Exeter Hall; they formed a committee and opened a subscription for the tickets for the concert, which quickly raised nearly £200. But as they were unable to obtain Exeter Hall for the time when the concert was possible, the project had to be abandoned; the players had to leave London later to go to the Festival at Norwich. The subscribers then said they did not want to take their money back, and the Committee decided to devote the sum to the publication of the score of my Faust with an English text.
Berlioz never blamed the English for what happened at Covent Garden, as his letter of 16 July to his younger sister Adèle shows (CG no. 1619):
I have completely recovered from my London ordeal; but you are wrong in making the English responsible for the Covent Garden scandal which forced me to withdraw my work immediately; they had no part in it. It was solely the work of a band of Italians, and the entire English press has not concealed the fact. On the contrary, the English have honoured me in a most tactful manner. [...] Never have I had more supporters in London than I do now, and sooner or later there will probably be a good position for me here. But I am also a dreadful nuisance to some other positions, especially Italian ones. You would never imagine what makes me most feared in a certain very powerful quarter; it is my talent as a conductor, which is acclaimed by all musicians. But I would have too much to tell you. This does not prevent me from loving this dear score of Benvenuto more than ever; it is more lively, fresh, and novel (that is one of its great faults) than any of my other works. Liszt writes to me that they will put it on again carefully in Weimar.
Other distinguished foreigners present in London at the time Cellini was performed were Hiller, Molique, Spohr, Lindpaintner, Barret and Vieuxtemps, some of whom knew Berlioz very well back in France. They were all invited by John Ella, the founder of the Musical Union, to attend its meetings and concerts at Hanover Square. You can see Berlioz with them in a group picture drawn by Charles Baugniet at one of the Union’s meetings in Willis’ Rooms – Musical Union.
All the modern photos reproduced on this page were taken by
Michel Austin; other pictures have been scanned from engravings and newspapers in our own collection.
© Monir Tayeb and Michel Austin.
All rights of reproduction reserved.
Theatre Royal Covent Garden in the 19th century
This engraving was made in1861.
Interior of the Theatre Royal Covent Garden in 1847
This engraving, published in the Illustrated London News of 10 April 1847 shows the opening of the new Opera House with a performance of Rossini’s Semiramide.
Interior of the Theatre Royal Covent Garden in 1847
This engraving appeared in The Pictorial Times of 3 April
1847.
Theatre Royal Covent Garden in 1850
Burning of the Theatre Royal Covent Garden in 1856
This engraving has been scanned from the 15 March 1856 issue of the Illustrated London News.
© 2002-2008 Michel Austin and Monir Tayeb for all the pictures and information on this page.
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