David Cairns is a great Berlioz scholar. Like to meet him someday. His translation of "Memoirs" is much superior to Newmans.I bought the 1st volume of the biography some years ago when it first came out and the second a couple of years ago when it was first published. I revisit these volumes frequently. Berlioz was one of the really great romantics. At least 50 years before his time. Glad to see SF opera is planning on staging Cellini & B & B over the next few years. Sixtus Beckmesser

This really is one of the best biographies of any subject to come my way.I didn't know a lot of Berlioz's music before approaching this but it didn't actually matter.All the elements of a gripping novel are here only for they're true!-fighting paternal disapproval,living in poverty in Paris,eloping with a virtuoso pianist-it's all here and Cairns paints such an intimate picture that you can't but fail to admire Berlioz and his dogged determination to be a composer and write HIS music only to be continually rebuked in his native homeland.The efforts that the man had to go to just to hear his own music is truly heartbreaking.Biography doesn't get much better than this-especially if you're only even remotely interested in music or art.

This is a wonderful book both for the lay reader and for the musically knowledgeable. It says a great deal about how well written this book is that someone like me who knows nothing about music could still enjoy the book so much. Mr. Cairns takes the tale from the birth of Berlioz in 1803 up until 1832, when he was in his late 20's. You learn about his relationship with his parents, who were opposed to his choice of composer for a career, and his sisters. We are very fortunate that this was a great age for letter writing. Mr. Cairns makes judicious use of the correspondence between Berlioz and his family and friends to the point where you almost feel yourself to be a friend or family member. You get inside the young composer's mind as he tries to convince his parents that his desire to write music is not just a "whim", but something that he is absolutely passionate about and must do. Berlioz was also extremely sensitive and romantic. After seeing the English actress Harriet Smithson perform on stage in several works by Shakespeare he developed an obsessive love for her, even though he had never met her. He had an apartment across the street from where she lived and would longingly watch her comings and goings. He eventually wrote her several notes expressing his feelings but she rebuffed him, quite understandably one would think! (She had also heard a rumor, which was untrue, that he was an epileptic.) Shortly after coming to the realization that Smithson was unattainable Berlioz met the virtuoso pianist Camille Moke and they fell in love with each other and eventually got engaged. Alas, when poor Hector had to go to Rome to live in order to receive grant money from winning the Prix de Rome, Camille dumped him and opted for security by marrying a wealthy man. This soured Hector on women for awhile but did not diminish his love for music, nature and life. Mr. Cairns has been a professional music critic and is also a scholar, so he understands and ably explains the technical aspects of Berlioz's music. I was totally lost in these sections but my ignorance did not diminish my enjoyment of this sympathetic and wonderfully written book.

For the most part, this is a highly entertaining account of an all-too-human composer. The story appeals to musicians and non-musicians alike. My only problem with the book was the trips to Germany. I found this section of the book to be dry. I felt like this section was mostly devoted to relating who were the best players in the orchestra, and how the rehearsals went. Although some of that information would be of much use when doing a research paper, it wasn't especially interesting to me. Besides that, though, the book was a great read. Some of his anecdotes will remain in my memory for years to come. "The Last Chapter of All" was particularly engrossing. Berlioz most certainly was someone who experienced every extreme of emotion!

Although I cannot comment on the translation (for I have nothing to compare it to), the notes made by Ernest Newman are often pertinent and interesting.

Overall, I recommend this book. I feel that we can all identify will Berlioz to some extent. This book pretty much had it all. It had thoughtful commentary, poignant experiences, unrequited love, and humorous anecdotes.

The inimitable Hector Berlioz was a prolific writer (perhaps he missed his true calling). His memoirs are an irresistible and captivating read, giving us an all too brief window into his life-long struggles, both personally and professionally. Cairns did a bang-up job at translation (no real complaints here) and the Everyman's edition is splendidly printed.

Anyone familiar with the works of Oscar Wilde will of course know where the "take-off" above comes from. And how trenchantly - even scathingly - funny that particular work is, even to the point where some folks have fun citing extended passages at will, out loud, just for the "yuks" it contains. Well, add "The Memoirs of Hector Berlioz" to that short list.

I am now barely 100 pages into this screamer, after having recently concluded reading the magisterial and sympathetic two-volume biography of Berlioz by David Cairns (who also provides the perfect translation of these Memoirs). Frankly, I wasn't sure that I could handle "yet more Berlioz" so soon after finishing the Cairns volumes (although Cairns provided plenty of justification, in terms of his ability to pinpoint Berlioz's scathing wit).

I shouldn't have worried.

Berlioz is certainly famous among music lovers, and musicians and composers, for a long list of "firsts": The first to take the proto-Romantic beginnings started so auspiciously by Beethoven to new heights, the first to expand the size (and instruments) of the classical orchestra to something closely resembling today's symphony orchestra, the first to write a detailed study on the uses of the instruments in the orchestra, including the effects of venue acoustics on the orchestra's sound... It's a long list, and this is just a part of it.

But Berlioz was also a brilliant writer. Inter alia, his "feuilletons" (music & arts criticism for the cultural journals of his time) and his "Evenings in the Orchestra" (including several of his better feuilletons) showed both his brilliance as a writer on the arts and his scathing wit. And that wit comes across as well in his Memoirs, as can be evidenced by this example on his very first page:

"Needless to say, I was brought up in the Catholic and Apostolic Church of Rome. This charming religion (so attractive since it gave up burning people) was for seven whole years the joy of my life, and although we have long since fallen out I have always kept most tender memories of it. Indeed, such is its appeal for me that had I the misfortune to be born into the bosom of one of those schisms ponderously hatched by Luther or Calvin I should undoubtedly abjured it the moment I was able..."

It gets even better later on, and the Memoirs are very well served by Cairns's idiomatic translation that so perfectly captures the trenchantly ascerbic writing qualities of which Berlioz was so capable. (Apparently, earlier translations, whether due to "bowdlerization" or simple lack of supporting documents, did not succeed to the same degree in capturing all of these qualities.)

Berlioz started these Memoirs while in his mid-40's and while in London for performances of his works and finding himself with some spare time. From then until the end of his life two decades later, he would add to them, with the express requirement that they be published posthumously. There is no need to "wonder why" at this requirement: He had something to say about nearly everything and everybody in the world of music and culture of his time, and wasn't afraid to "name names." And good for him!

I hope to have more (but not too much more) to say about these alternately hilarious and moving Memoirs once I've finished them. In the meantime, I hope that these brief comments serve to whet your appetite for one of the best books ever written about music by a musician. And a suitably famous one at that. This hardcover version is inexpensive and beautifully bound; a worthwhile addition to every music lover's library.

I bought this book in July and am still reading it, though I am now more than halfway through it. Like any biography of this size, Cairns occasionally runs into the "and then he wrote....and then he played..." syndrome, and to be honest, after a while each struggle to pull together an orchestra and interest an audience reads like each previous instance. On the other hand, it dispels many myths about Berlioz and his acceptance in his time, among them the fact that he never really stopped loving Harriet or her artistic soul even after her descent into alcoholism, delusions and strokes. It also shows that Berlioz did indeed have his champions, even in Paris where he also had enemies, based solely on the fact that his music was multi-rhythmic and therefore hard to follow! Among the many champions of his music were the Germans, Austrians and Russians, but especially the Hungarians and British, who heard and appreciated the great and wonderful things in his music.

The person one feels sorriest for is his son Louis, born into a marriage that Berlioz' father and sisters opposed, sent to boarding school when his mother descended into alcoholism and madness, seldom receiving the bonding love of his all-too-busy father. We also learn that Berlioz purposely suppressed inspirations to compose symphonies because he couldn't afford to perform them, and he wanted to use the money to help set up his son as a sailor.

Best of all, however, we get a VERY realistic glimpse into the performing world of the early-to-late 19th century, in which composers had to foot the bill for the performance (and copying) of their own works, playing to half-filled houses and often losing money on their ventures. We also learn of the strengths and weaknesses of the various musical centers of Europe, particularly the weaknesses, so much so that the composer often deleted movements from his symphonies and masses because the performers could not play them correctly. Thus the "golden age" of the Romantic era is dispelled as a myth propagated by rumor and hearsay. The reality is far less sunny, making us realize that even then art music struggled to find an audience and be appreciated.

Most of all, one suffers along with Berlioz, feels his angst and anguish as he struggles time and again to establish and re-establish himself in the face of organized, official opposition. Yes, there were critics and audiences who did recognize his genius and love his music, cruel reviews and nasty caricatures to the contrary, and this acceptance was much more widespread among lay listeners than we have been led to believe. Berlioz was cheered, mobbed and loved by practically every European culture center EXCEPT Paris, and even there he had his partisans....just never enough to keep him afloat financially or help him get his music produced.

If you love classical music and enjoy Berlioz, this is a recommended read.....just go slowly, don't try to speed-read through it, and you will get a lot more out of it.

As a dedicated Berliozian since my teens, I've read several biographies on him in both English and French, but nothing comes close to David Cairns' exhaustive (but never exhausting) treatment, not even Jacques Barzun's now-classic treatment which helped to ignite the Berlioz revival decades ago. Part of the reason is the author's style--consistently engaging without ever becoming weighed down by boring detail. Cairns has a way of enlisting the reader's sympathies not only for Berlioz himself but also for his wife Harriet Smithson and his son Louis as well as his friends like Paganini and Liszt who fostered his career. These are all well-rounded portraits of some of the most prominent figures of an immensely eciting period of musical history. Most of all, one gets an indelible impression of Berlioz not only as a musical genius but even more as a brilliant writer. His letters, hundreds of which are fully quoted, reveal him as a man passionately dedicated the cause of great music and willing to express his honest convictions regardless of the opposition of the the crowd of mediocrities who had turned the Parisian musical environment into a haven for everything meretricious. It is sad to read of the success of such minitalent as Adolphe Adam , Auber and Thomas while Berlioz, the greatest French musician of his time (or perhaps the Greatest French musician, period) was forced to earn his living as a critic. If this book has any drawbacks, it is in the relatively little space devoted to discussion of the music itself. What the author does write about Berlioz's works is so insightful that it leaves me wishing for more--a lot more. This is especially true of Les Troyens. A vast opera such as this cannot be adequately discussed in a few paragraphs. But, admittedly, this is a biography, not a work of musical analysis. I'm grateful for what we have--a vivid portrait of a musical genius who really come alive as never before in these pages. Berlioz was incapable of writing a dull page. His letters are full of vivid imagery--metaphors and similes that paint the picture or express the thought memorably. My favorite example is, I am afraid, one that shows the caustic side of the man: Describing the singing of his mistress--later his wife--Marie Recio, he wrote "She sings like a cat". But I should not end on that note--Berlioz was a kind man as well as a genius--what a contrast to Wagner, whose overwhelming music caused the undeserved neglect from which Berlioz is still recovering over a century after his death. I hhope this book will send its readers back to the music as it has done for me.