Berlioz: Volume Two: Servitude and Greatness

Berlioz: Volume Two: Servitude and Greatness by Cairns, David. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780520222007.

This biography of composer Hector Berlioz (1803-1869) describes with unprecedented intimacy, affection, and respect the life of one of Frances greatest artists. After long being regarded as an oddity and an eccentric figure, Berlioz is now being accepted into the ranks of the great composers. Based on a wealth of previously unpublished sources, and on a profound understanding of the humanity of his subject, David Cairnss book provides a full account of this extraordinary and powerfully attractive man. Volume II follows Berliozs life from 1832 to his death in 1869, his most active years as a composer, conductor, and critic. This volume provides telling portraits of those close to Berlioz: his two wives, his son and his sisters, his friends and colleagues, fellow composers and critics. Cairns vividly evokes Berliozs music and the music-making world of nineteenth-century Paris. Volume II also includes chapters on Wagner, Berliozs career as a critic, the composers concert tours in Germany, Russia, and England, and much more.