Introduction
Chronological outline
Technical notes
This page is also available in French
1997 | 2003 | 2007 | 2011 | 2015 | 2019 | 2023 |
2000 | 2004 | 2008 | 2012 | 2016 | 2020 | 2024 |
2001 | 2005 | 2009 | 2013 | 2017 | 2021 | 2025 |
2002 | 2006 | 2010 | 2014 | 2018 | 2022 | 2026 |
This personal site, a homage to Hector Berlioz, was created by Michel Austin and Monir Tayeb on 18 July 1997 as a one-page site; it subsequently grew through the addition of numerous pages and sections.
The chronological outline below charts the development of the site year by year since its creation. In addition, three separate pages chart the progress of particular sections of the site:
For a listing of original contributions and other articles published on the site over the years see the following pages:
18/07/1997 | Foundation of the site, comprising initially a single page mainly reporting a few forthcoming concerts, news, latest CD releases and recent publications |
Major pages added subsequently:
03/12/1997 | Berlioz Photo Album (reconstructed on 23/04/1998, 29/07/1999 and 22/02/2002) |
12/12/1997 | Berlioz and Literature (reconstructed on 29/07/1999 and 23/02/2002) |
21/04/1998 | Berlioz’s
Birthplace – La Côte Saint-André (reconstructed on 24 and 29/07/1999 and 17/02/2002; many revisions and additions since) |
19/01/1999 | You and Berlioz’s Music (in English) |
04/08/1999 | La ville natale de
Berlioz – La Côte Saint-André (French version of Berlioz’s
Birthplace – La Côte Saint-André) (reconstructed on 17/02/2002; many revisions and additions since) |
01/01/2000 | Berlioz Music Scores (see also the detailed history of this page) |
Between 27/12/ 2000 & 30/06/2002 |
Creation of many separate pages and sections including : Recent News, Diary of Forthcoming Performances, Recent Publications (completely developed in 2002 as Berlioz Bibliography), Recent Recordings (extensively developed in 2002 as Berlioz Discography), Review of Live Performances (completely reorganised on 25 December 2008), Berlioz Celebrations, and Notice Board (this last page has been discontinued) |
24/06/2000 | Berlioz, sa musique et vous (in French) |
17/07/2000 | Berlioz: Rapport sur l’Exposition de 1851 (in French) |
19/10/2000 | Berlioz in Paris (reorganised on 24/12/2000, enlarged on 26/06/2001, followed by several updates; a new version of this page on 15 June 2011) |
20/10/2000 | Berlioz à Paris (French version of Berlioz in Paris) |
05/07/2001 | Site moved to www.hberlioz.com and reorganised under the name The Hector Berlioz Website |
20/07/2001 | Online History of the Site |
15/09/2001:– | Partitions de Berlioz – Textes et Documents (in French) |
Berlioz Musical and Literary Works | |
09/10/2001 | Berlioz Music Scores – Texts and Documents (English version of Partitions de Berlioz – Textes et Documents) |
24/10/2001 | Partitions de Berlioz – Extraits du Traité d’instrumentation et d’orchestration (in the original French) |
02/11/2001 | Berlioz
Music Scores – Extracts from the Treatise on the Instrumentation and
Orchestration (English version of Partitions de Berlioz – Extraits du Traité d’instrumentation et d’orchestration) |
01/01/2002:– | Berlioz in London |
Berlioz: Report on the 1851 Exhibition (English translation of Berlioz: Rapport sur l’Exposition de 1851) | |
03/03/2002:– | Page d’accueil (French version of the Home Page) |
Historique du Site (French version of the Online History of the Site) | |
08/03/2002 | Berlioz à Londres (French version of Berlioz in London) |
24/05/2002 | Berlioz Discography |
August 2002 | Interview with Sir Colin Davis (by David Cairns) |
15/09/2002 | Berlioz Bibliography |
11/12/2002 | Berlioz: Predecessors and Contemporaries (see also the detailed history of this page) |
01/01/2003 | Berlioz Bicentenary
Special – Celebrating 2003 (a collection of invited contributions by eminent musicologists, musicians and writers on Berlioz) |
13/04/2003 | Berlioz Libretti |
18/05/2003 | A comprehensive search facility [Google] was installed on the site |
11/07/2003 | Berlioz in Lille |
10/08/2003 | Berlioz First Editions |
14/09/2003 | Berlioz Cartoons |
07/12/2003:– | Berlioz in Europe |
Berlioz in Italy | |
Berlioz in Russia | |
Berlioz-inspired works of arts | |
Berlioz Screen Saver (discontinued from March 2017) |
29/02/2004 | The première of Les Troyens in November 1863 |
15/04/2004 | Berlioz in Meylan |
08/05/2004 | Berlioz:
Étude critique des symphonies de Beethoven [Berlioz: A Critical Study of the Symphonies of Beethoven] (original French text) |
11/06/2004 | Hector Berlioz’s Will |
01/08/2004 | Berlioz Biography |
19/09/2004 | Ernest Legouvé and Berlioz |
03/10/2004 | Berlioz:
A Critical Study of the Symphonies of Beethoven (English translation by Michel Austin of Berlioz: Étude critique des symphonies de Beethoven) |
01/11/2004 | Berlioz and his music – self-borrowings |
01/01/2005 | Berlioz Memorabilia |
01/02/2005:– | Berlioz in Germany |
Berlioz in Germany – Brunswick | |
01/04/2005 | Berlioz in Russia – Riga |
01/05/2005 | Berlioz’s Writings: À Travers Chants (original French text) |
01/06/2005 | Berlioz in Germany – Cologne |
01/07/2005 | Berlioz’s Writings: Les Soirées de l’Orchestre (original French text) |
01/08/2005:– | Berlioz: A Listing of his Musical Works |
Berlioz in Germany – Bonn | |
07/08/2005 | Diary of forthcoming performances of Berlioz’s music– purpose-built search function added |
01/09/2005 | Berlioz in Germany and Central Europe – Pesth |
01/10/2005 | Berlioz’s Writings: Les Grotesques de la Musique (original French text) |
01/11/2005 | A Bibliography of À Travers Chants (by Pepijn van Doesburg) |
01/12/2005 | Berlioz’s Writings: Memoirs (original French text) |
11/12/2005 | A Bibliography of Les Soirées de l’Orchestre (by Pepijn van Doesburg) |
14/12/2005 | A Bibliography of Les Grotesques de la Musique (by Pepijn van Doesburg) |
27/01/2006 | A Bibliography of Memoirs (by Pepijn van Doesburg) |
01/02/2006 | Berlioz: Literary texts on CD with built-in search function (discontinued from March 2017) |
19/02/2006 | Berlioz: Le Chef d’orchestre – théorie de son art [The Conductor – Theory of his Art] |
01/03/2006 | Berlioz in Strasbourg |
14/03/2006 | Archive of performances of Berlioz’s music (with a purpose-built search function) |
01/06/2006:– | Berlioz in Germany – Vienna |
Berlioz
und die Wiener Presse (original German) Berlioz et la presse viennoise (French translation by Michel Austin) Berlioz and the Viennese Press (English translation by Michel Austin) |
|
03/07/2006 | Berlioz in Germany – Hechingen and Löwenberg |
22/07/2006 | Berlioz in Germany – Gotha |
01/08/2006 | Berlioz in Germany – Darmstadt |
01/09/2006:– | Berlioz in Germany – Mannheim |
Berlioz in Germany – Stuttgart | |
01/10/2006 | Berlioz in Germany – Frankfurt |
01/11/2006:– | Berlioz in Germany – Hamburg |
Berlioz in Germany – Breslau | |
Berlioz and France | |
01/12/2006:– | Berlioz in Germany – Hanover |
Berlioz in Germany – Bremen | |
11/12/2006 | Berlioz in Bordeaux |
01/01/2007 | Berlioz in Germany – Leipzig |
01/02/2007:– | De Ontdekking van Berlioz’s ‘Messe Solennelle’ (by Werner Gladines – in Dutch) |
The
Discovery of Berlioz’s ‘Messe Solennelle’
(by Werner Gladines) (English translation by Michel Austin of De Ontdekking van Berlioz’s ‘Messe Solennelle’) |
|
La découverte
de la ‘Messe Solennelle’ de Berlioz (by Werner
Gladines) (French translation by Michel Austin of De Ontdekking van Berlioz’s ‘Messe Solennelle’) |
|
01/03/2007 | Berlioz in Germany – Dresden |
01/04/2007 | Berlioz in Germany – Berlin |
16/05/2007 | Berlioz in Germany and Central Europe – Prague |
16/06/2007:– | Scores not included in the New Berlioz Edition (by Pierre-René Serna) |
Berlioz Music Scores – Marche d’Isly | |
Berlioz Music Scores – Chant des Chérubins and Pater Noster | |
Berlioz Music Scores – Valse chantée par le vent dans les cheminées d’un de mes châteaux en Espagne | |
Installation of a search facility for Berlioz’s Writings | |
18/07/2007 | Berlioz in Belgium – Brussels |
11/08/2007 | The Completion of the Duo in La Nonne sanglante (by Hugh Macdonald) |
01/09/2007 | Index of letters of Berlioz cited |
15/10/2007:– | Berlioz in Germany – Baden-Baden |
Berlioz in Plombières-les-Bains | |
11/12/2007 | Berlioz in Italy – reorganised and substantially enlarged |
01/01/2008:– | Statues of Berlioz |
Original contributions | |
Berlioz: Contemporary Performances and Articles | |
01/02/2008 | Berlioz in Germany – Weimar |
01/03/2008 | Berlioz in Switzerland |
01/04/2008:– | Berlioz and Liszt |
Berlioz and Wagner | |
20/05/2008 | Berlioz in Versailles |
11/12/2008 | Berlioz in Grenoble |
01/01/2009:– | Berlioz in London – New version (considerably enlarged) |
Berlioz in London: friends and acquaintances | |
01/03/2009 | Hector Berlioz: Feuilletons – Journal des Débats 1834 - 1863 (start of a project to transcribe Berlioz’s feuilletons for this journal) |
06/03/2009 | Les Orages désirés – libretto by Christian Wasselin (an opera inspired by Berlioz’s youth) |
20/03/2009 | List of Berlioz’s feuilletons transcribed on this site (in French) |
05/05/2009 | Installation of a new and autonomous search engine for the whole site |
15/07/2009 | Rue Saint Vincent and Saint Vincent Cemetery (Paris) |
01/10/2009 | Berlioz in Meylan – New version |
01/11/2009 | Berlioz in Vienne (Isère) – New version |
15/01/2010 | Hector Berlioz: Mémoires d’un musicien – Le Monde Illustré 1858-1859 |
15/06/2010:– | Berlioz in Russia – New version (considerably enlarged) |
Berlioz and Russia: friends and acquaintances | |
Octave Fouque: Berlioz en Russie (from Les Révolutionnaires de la Musique, Paris, 1882) (in French) | |
01/07/2010 | H.
Berlioz, Voyage en Russie (1847) – Magasin
des Demoiselles, XII, 1855-1856 (in the original French, with introduction in French and English) |
11/12/2010:– | Berlioz and Lyon |
Berlioz and Marseille | |
Berlioz and Marseille: friends and acquaintances | |
Auguste Morel: documents on his career (in French) |
01/01/2011 | Berlioz and Germany: friends and acquaintances |
15/02/2011 | Berlioz and Lille – New version (enlarged) |
15/06/2011 | Berlioz in Paris, main page – New version (enlarged) |
01/10/2011 | Hector
Berlioz: Feuilletons – Journal des Débats 1834 - 1863 (Transcription of all the feuilletons from 1849 to 1863 completed) |
15/10/2011 | Ernest Reyer and Berlioz: articles (1867-1896) (in French) |
20/10/2011 | Auguste Morel and Berlioz (1876-1881) (in French) |
15/11/2011:– | Paris and Berlioz: the revival (Performances of his music, 1869-1884) |
Paris and Berlioz: the revival (Articles and reviews of concerts, 1869-1884) (in French) | |
01/12/2011:– | Hector
Berlioz: Feuilletons – Journal des Débats 1834 - 1863 (A dedicated search function added) |
Hector
Berlioz: Mémoires d’un musicien – Le Monde Illustré
1858-1859 (Transcription of all the articles completed) |
01/01/2012:– | Berlioz in Germany – Leipzig (substantially enlarged) |
Berlioz in Leipzig – A Train Journey from Leipzig to Dresden in 1843 | |
Faust in Leipzig | |
05/02/2012 | Site Statistics – New version |
01/03/2012:– | Berlioz in Germany – Weimar (substantially enlarged) |
Berlioz in Weimar – Goethe and Schiller in Weimar | |
Berlioz in Weimar – Berlioz’s Weimar in our time | |
15/03/2012:– | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions |
Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – David Cairns | |
Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Colin Davis | |
Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Hugh Macdonald | |
Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Jules-Étienne Pasdeloup | |
01/05/2012:– | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Julien Tiersot |
Julien Tiersot – “Berlioziana” series and other articles (1904-1911) | |
01/06/2012:– | Berlioz in Italy – Nice (substantially enlarged) |
Berlioz in Nice – Berlioz’s Nice in our time | |
15/07/2012 | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Hans von Bülow |
25/07/2012 01/10/2012 |
Berlioz in Italy (numerous additions) |
01/09/2012 | Berlioz and Monaco |
15/10/2012:– | Festival de l’Industrie |
Cirque Olympique – New version |
01/03/2013:– | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Charles Lamoureux |
Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Édouard Colonne | |
Édouard Colonne: textes et documents (1) | |
Édouard Colonne: textes et documents (2) | |
An autograph letter of Édouard Alexandre to Édouard Colonne | |
An autograph letter of Édouard Colonne to the Mayor of La Côte Saint-André | |
Document sur Édouard Colonne | |
01/05/2013 | The Paris Conservatoire and Berlioz: 1869-1914 |
01/07/2013 | Berlioz’s operas in France, 1869-1914 |
01/08/2013:– | Berlioz in Paris – Parc Monceau |
Berlioz in Paris – Salle Herz (substantially enlarged) | |
Berlioz in Paris – Jardin du Luxembourg (enlarged) | |
01/10/2013:– | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Georges de Massougnes |
Georges
de Massougnes: BERLIOZ.
SON ŒUVRE (1870) (Complete transcription of the 1870 edition, together with the preface added by Massougnes’ son to the 1919 reissue of the book) |
|
01/11/2013 | Julien
Tiersot – “Berlioziana” series and other articles (1904-1911) (Transcription of all the articles completed) |
11/12/2013 | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Felix Mottl |
11/12/2013 | Felix Mottl: textes et documents |
01/02/2014 | Hector Berlioz:
Feuilletons – Journal des Débats 1834 - 1863 (Resumption of the transcription of the remaining feuilletons written by Berlioz, i.e. from 1834 to 1848) |
08/03/2014 | Between 3rd February and 7 March 2014 the entire Hector Berlioz website was converted to conform to HTML 4.01 Transitional; this has involved modifications to the code of over 4200 pages of html, as well as the systematic introduction of stylesheets. |
22/06/2014 | Award of the Berlioz
Society Medal In February we were awarded the Berlioz Society Medal, which we received at a meeting of the Society on 22 June 2014. |
11/12/2014 | Letters of the
composer’s family at the Hector Berlioz Museum 244 letters and documents from 1823 to 1878 (in French, with introduction in English) |
01/02/2015 | Le voyage en Italie
— Le séjour à Rome (in French) Two articles written by Michel Austin in 2012 for the catalogue of the exhibition on Hector Berlioz et l’Italie. Voyage musical at the Hector Berlioz Museum; they are reproduced on the site in a modified version. |
01/04/2015 | Letters of the
composer’s family at the Bibliothèque
nationale de France 28 letters from 1803 to 1849 (in French, with introduction in English) |
13/05/ 2015 | Technical information On 13 May 2015 all the html/htm pages of the site were converted from the windows-1252 coding to the universal standard utf-8. This involved the modification and uploading of nearly 5300 files in all. |
01/10/2015 | Letters of the
composer at the Hector Berlioz Museum - Chronological tables (in French, with introduction in English) Letters of the composer at the Hector Berlioz Museum - Dating (in French, with introduction in English) |
08/03/2016 | Hector Berlioz:
Feuilletons – Journal des Débats 1834 - 1863 (New
enlarged version) List of Berlioz’s feuilletons transcribed on this site (New enlarged version) Berlioz: Feuilletons – Excerpts from the composer’s correspondence Berlioz: Feuilletons – Notices in the Journal des Débats (New enlarged version) The transcription of Berlioz’s feuilletons which was started in March 2009 was completed on 8 March 2016 |
08/03/2016 | Index of letters of Berlioz cited on this site (New enlarged version) |
01/08/2016 | Institut de France (New version, substantially enlarged) |
01/08/2016 | Institut de France - Chronology |
01/01/2017 | The Société Philharmonique, 1850-1851 La Société Philharmonique, 1850-1851: textes et documents (in French) |
01/02/2017 | Concerts and performances 1825-1869 Concerts and performances 1825-1869 — texts and documents |
01/04/2017 | Beginning of the conversion of the entire site from HTML 4.01 Transitional to HTML 5 (<!doctype html>) |
18/07/2017 | Twentieth anniversary of the foundation of the site |
01/10/2017 | Completion of the conversion of the site from HTML4.01 Transitional to HTML5 (<!doctype html>) |
01/12/2017 | Théatre-Lyrique (New version, substantially enlarged) |
01/01/2018 | The Première of Les Troyens in November 1863 (New version, substantially enlarged) |
01/01/2018 | Conversion of all internal hyperlinks from absolute to relative links |
15/05/2018 | An autograph document of 1866 — Berlioz’s finances |
01/07/2018 | Tom S. Wotton, Hector Berlioz (1935), Preface and Chapters 1-6 |
01/08/2018 | Tom S. Wotton, Hector Berlioz (1935), Chapters 7-9, Bibliography, Index (with hyperlinks) |
01/09/2018 | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Tom S. Wotton |
01/10/2018 | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Charles Malherbe |
01/12/2018 | Berlioz and the Americas |
01/01/2019 | Berlioz and the Americas – Concert programmes of the 20th century |
01/02/2019 |
Felix Weingartner: five articles on Berlioz (translated from the German by Michel Austin) Felix Weingartner: excerpts from his writings (original German text) |
08/03/2019 | Berlioz 150: celebrations for the 150th anniversary of his death |
01/04/2019 | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Felix Weingartner Felix Weingartner: excerpts from Le Ménestrel, 1891-1940 (in French) |
01/08/2019 | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Sir Hamilton Harty Hamilton Harty on Berlioz (1928) |
01/11/2019 | Eugène de Mirecourt: Berlioz (1856) (complete French text with English introduction) Les Soirées de l’orchestre: excerpts from the composer’s correspondence (French text with introduction in English) Les Grotesques de la musique: excerpts from the composer’s correspondence (French text with introduction in English) À Travers chants: excerpts from the composer’s correspondence (French text with introduction in English) |
01/12/2019 | Voyage musical en Allemagne et en Italie (1844): Introduction (English), excerpts from the composer’s correspondence, table of contents (French) A.A. Cuvillier-Fleury: review (1845) of Voyage musical (in French) |
01/01/2020 | Berlioz Mémoires – Composition and history (English version of La genèse des Mémoires) |
01/02/2020 | Adolphe Jullien: Hector Berlioz (1870) (French text, with introduction in English) |
01/03/2020 | Adolphe Jullien: excerpts from his feuilletons on Berlioz for the Journal des Débats, 1893-1925 (French text, with introduction in English) |
01/06/2020 | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Adolphe Jullien |
01/08/2020 | Berlioz: Pioneers and Champions – Sir Thomas Beecham |
01/11/2020 | Berlioz Photo Album (revised and enlarged) |
01/02/2021 | Contemporary performances and articles (revised)
Original contributions and other articles (revised) Statues (revised) |
01/03/2021 | Site Statistics (new enlarged version) Letter of Paganini to Berlioz |
08/03/2021 | The Programme of the Symphonie fantastique |
01/04/2021 | Berlioz and Germany (revised) |
15/05/2021 | Berlioz Discography (revised) |
01/07/2021 | Berlioz: Predecessors and Contemporaries: completion of the revision of the pages on Beethoven, Gluck, Halévy, Liszt, Méhul, Meyerbeer, Spontini, Wagner, and Weber, started on 01/05/2021 |
01/08/2021 | Berlioz: Predecessors and Contemporaries: new enlarged version of the home page, with scores added in pdf format |
01/10/2021 | Monir Tayeb Academic Page Monir and Berlioz Beginning of the revision of Berlioz Music Scores, with scores added in pdf format |
01/06/2022 | Berlioz Music Scores: completion of the revision and enlargement of the pages on individual works (started on 01/10/2021), with scores added in pdf format |
01/07/2022 | Revision of Berlioz Music Scores: Texts and Documents |
18/07/2022 | 25th anniversary of the foundation of the Hector Berlioz Website |
01/09/2022 | Page Extracts from the Treatise on Instrumentation and Orchestration revised and enlarged Revision of Reviews of live performances of Berlioz’s music |
01/10/2022 | Revision of Berlioz-inspired Works of Art Revision of Berlioz Cartoons |
01/11/2022 | Revision of Berlioz Libretti |
01/12/2022 | Revision of Berlioz: A Complete Listing of his Musical Works Revision of Berlioz and his music: self-borrowings Revision of the home page of Berlioz’s Writings |
01/01/2023 | Revision of You and Berlioz’s music |
01/02/2023 | Page Berlioz Biography revised and enlarged |
01/03/2023 | Revision of the pages L’Entente Cordiale Revision of the pages Ernest Legouvé and Berlioz and Ernest Legouvé: Soixante ans de souvenirs |
01/04/2023 | Berlioz Anniversaries Revision of the pages Celebrations of Berlioz’s 200th birthday and Berlioz 150. Celebrations of the 150th anniversary of his death |
01/05/2023 | Revision of the pages Berlioz Bicentenary Special - Celebrating 2003 |
01/06/2023 | Updates of the Website Collège Hector Berlioz (in Paris) Revision of Berlioz in Meylan Revision of Berlioz and Europe (including Berlioz in Belgium, Berlioz and Monaco and Berlioz in Switzerland) |
01/07/2023 | Revision of Berlioz in France (home page), Bordeaux, Grenoble pages, Lille |
01/08/2023 | Revision of Lyon, Marseille and Berlioz and Marseille: friends and acquaintances |
01/09/2023 | Revision of Plombières, Strasbourg, and Versailles Revision of Berlioz Feuilletons: Excerpts from the composer’s correspondence, and Berlioz: Notices in the Journal des Débats (both in French) |
01/10/2023 | Revision of Berlioz: Feuilletons – Journal des Débats 1834 - 1863 (home page) |
01/11/2023 | Revision of the pages The première of Les Troyens in 1863 |
01/12/2023 | Revision of the pages Letters of the composer’s family at the Hector Berlioz Museum |
01/01/2024 | Revision of Letters of the composer at the Hector Berlioz Museum - Chronological tables and of Letters of the composer at the Hector Berlioz Museum - Dating |
01/02/2024 | Revision of Baden-Baden, Berlin, Bonn, Bremen, Breslau, Brunswick, Cologne, Darmstadt, and Pesth/Budapest |
01/03/2024 | Revision of Dresden, Frankfurt, Gotha, Hamburg, Hanover, Hechingen and Löwenberg, and Leipzig |
01/04/2024 | Revision of Mannheim, Prague, Stuttgart, Vienna, and Weimar |
01/05/2024 | Revision of all pages in the section on La Côte Saint-André |
01/06/2024 | Revision of all pages in the section on Berlioz in Italy |
01/07/2024 | Revision of all pages in the section on Berlioz in London |
01/08/2024 | Revision of all pages in Berlioz Photo Album section Revision of all the feuilletons for the years 1834, 1835 and 1836 |
01/09/2024 | Revision of all the feuilletons for the years 1837 and 1838 |
01/10/2024 | Revision of all the feuilletons for the years 1839, 1840 and 1841 |
The above entries summarise year by year the additions made to the site since its creation in July 1997. The following notes set out the technical means used to create and maintain the site.
Initially we used exclusively Microsoft Windows as operating system for our computers (up to Windows 7 but not beyond). Since 2013 we have been making increasing use of other operating systems as well, notably Mac OSX (from OSX.8 [Mountain Lion] upwards), and especially Linux (Linux Mint, an Ubuntu-based distribution).
For web-editing software we used initially and for many years Microsoft FrontPage (at first FrontPage 97, then soon FrontPage 2000). This programme is convenient and easy to use, but has major flaws and is liable to generate faulty code. At first we were not aware of its limitations, but have since July 2015 completely discontinued its use and have sought to remedy the numerous faults it created; this involved removal or updating of code that was either faulty or obsolescent, and was a time-consuming process. We now rely primarily on Adobe Dreamweaver (Dreamweaver CS6 and also Dreamweaver CC 2015), and also make occasional use of BlueGriffon (currently version 3.01). But we increasingly prefer to work directly in html code, for which Sublime Text (version 4) is our preferred code-editor.
In addition to the basic creation and editing of web pages and their code, we rely on various software programmes for special purposes: Adobe PhotoShop Elements for image editing, Sibelius for the creation of musical scores and images of them (most scores were made with versions I.4 and 3; images of scores are created with version 6), Zoom Search Engine (by Wrensoft) for all the indexing of the site (version 6). Files are uploaded to and downloaded from the server using FileZilla; other similar programmes are available.
Initially our web pages did not use any explicit doctype declaration (this was a result of using FrontPage, which did not include any doctype declaration). In February and March 2014 we converted the entire site to Doctype 4.01 Transitional (loose), the format which approximated most closely what we had been using; the move to this doctype required numerous corrections of detail to the code (the apparent non-existence of doctype conversion software makes this kind of task difficult). In May 2015 we converted all html pages from windows-1252 coding to the universal standard utf-8.
Though very large the structure of the site is relatively straightforward. It has been our objective from the start to make its appearance and presentation clear and simple: the site consists for the most part of pages of text, images, and tables, with a minimum of formatting. It is organised in one basic root folder with over 30 subfolders, each corresponding to one of site’s major sections or topics (archive, concerts, cities and countries visited by Berlioz, scores, writings etc.). The site comprises at present well over 14,000 files in all, of which nearly 6,000 are html files and the rest mostly image files of various kinds (gif and jpg), plus some files with specialised functions (e.g. index files, style-sheets etc.). The total size of the site online is at present over 500 MB.
The entire site is archived regularly every month and has been since 2005. The archive comprises both working files and files online; it is preserved on several computers, external hard disks, CDs and DVDs. The archives are kept in two different locations, and are in formats that make them readable on all three major operating systems (Windows, Mac OSX and Linux).
In April 2017, with a view to safeguarding the long-term future of the site, we decided to convert it ourselves from its present doctype (HTML 4.01 Transitional), which we had adopted in March 2014 (see above), to the latest universal standard HTML 5 as defined by the World Wide Web Consortium (https://www.w3.org). This involved extensive rewriting of the code for the entire site. Some tags were now obsolete (such as the <font> tag, used to define font families, font sizes and colours), and have to be completely replaced. Other tags, and notably the 3 most commonly used on our website — the paragraph <p> tag for formatting text, the <img> tag for images of all kinds, and the <table> tag for all tables — continue to be used in HTML 5 but the attributes associated with them have frequently changed. For example the tag for centred text <p align="center"> now has to be rewritten as <p style="text-align:center">, and tables are now formatted not with inline attributes but mostly with internal and external stylesheets. The whole process of removing and replacing obsolete code was very time-consuming, since every single html file had to be checked individually on computer and validated online with the validation service provided by the World Wide Web Consortium (https://validator.w3.org). The process took months to complete, as outlined below.
(1 May 2017) About 500 files have been converted out of a total of more than 5,500, including Berlioz concerts and recent news, Berlioz cartoons, Berlioz-inspired art postcards, the celebrations of Berlioz’s bicentenary in 2003 and all the nearly 400 feuilletons he wrote for the Journal des Débats between 1834 and 1863.
(1 June 2017) A total of over 1,000 files have now been converted, including the files relating to Berlioz-inspired works of art, contemporary performances and articles, the première of Les Troyens in 1863, his travels in Europe (Belgium, Monaco and Switzerland, but not including Germany, Italy, London, and Russia), Berlioz biography, catalogues and bibliographies of his musical and literary works, first editions of his published scores, and the complete text of his four published books (Les Soirées de l’orchestre, Les Grotesques de la musique, À Travers chants, and his posthumous Mémoires).
(1 July 2017) A total of over 1,500 files have now been converted, including all the files concerning the Archive of performances of Berlioz’s music, the Pioneers and Champions of Berlioz, the Letters of the composer’s family at the Hector Berlioz Museum, and Berlioz’s travels in Russia.
(1 August 2017) A total of over 2,600 files have now been converted, including all the files concerning La Côte-Saint-André, Vienne (Isère) and Meylan, Berlioz Libretti and Berlioz and Literature, Berlioz Statues, Berlioz in London (including Friends and acquaintances, and his Report on the Great Exhibition in London 1851), Berlioz Predecessors and Contemporaries (but excluding the files of musical scores).
(1 September 2017) A total of over 4,500 files have now been converted, including all the files concerning Berlioz Photo Album, Berlioz Music Scores (including Texts and Documents relating to Berlioz’s music, the excerpts from the Treatise on Instrumentation and Orchestration and the Conductor’s Art, but excluding the files containing actual musical scores), Berlioz’s travels in France, Germany and Central Europe, Berlioz Discography, Berlioz Memorabilia and Bicentenary Special, and finally the Home Page of the site and files related to it (notably Site History and Site Statistics).
(1 October 2017) During September a further 1,000 files have been converted, including a number of autobiographical articles by Berlioz himself (in Le Monde Illustré and Le Magasin des Demoiselles), articles and studies about Berlioz, notably by Ernest Reyer (in the Journal des Débats) and the extensive series of Berlioziana by Julien Tiersot (in Le Ménestrel), and the more than 800 pages concerning Berlioz and Paris (his residential addresses, public buildings and venues, his career and activities in Paris). With one exception the conversion of the entire site to HTML5 is now complete and every single page has been validated with the validation service provided by the World Wide Web Consortium, making a total of about 5,500 pages of html. The exception mentioned concerns a group of around 500 files of musical scores which are in a proprietary format which cannot be converted to HTML5.
(1 January 2018) All internal hyperlinks on the site have been converted from absolute to relative links. For example, depending on the location on the site of the file where the link is placed, the address of the English home page is now expressed in code more concisely either as "index.html" or as "../index.html", and no longer as the full "http://www.hberlioz.com/index.html". This change has involved rewriting the code of all html pages on the site, some 6,000 in all.