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With 35 mni magnetic film, the base material on which the magnetic
oxide is coated is five times thicker than conventional tape and is
similar to the film used for motion pictures. This thickness permits
the recording of extremely high sound intensities without the danger
of layer-to-layer ‘‘print-through.’’ The width of 35 mm magnetic film
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‘background noise’’ is inaudible. Another*similarity of magnetic film
to motion picture film is that it has sprocket holes cut along each
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ness of motion that reduces ‘‘wow and flutter’ to an absolute minimum.
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heretofore almost impossible to control.
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BELOCK INSTRUMENT (of which EVEREST is a division), requested
Westrex Corporation to build special equipment to EVEREST’S exact-
ing specifications in order to accomplish these advantages. This
equipment includes the use of special recording heads which afford
complete wide band frequency response beyond that normally speci-
fied in any present day motion picture recording. It is of interest to
note, that when sound tracks of great motion pictures originally re-
corded on 35 mm magnetic film are released as phonograph records,
the normal technique is to re-record the sound from the 35 mm mag-
netic film to conventional tape. EVEREST, through its advanced
processes and equipment, is the only record company able to trans-
fer all Master Records directly from the 35 mm magnetic film to the
recording heads.
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and maintain the rigid standards and excellence of quality available
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A PRODUCT OF BELOCK RECORDING « DIVISION OF BELOCK INST
BERLIOZ: Symphonie Fantastique, Op. 14
| Sir Eugene Goossens conducting
The London Symphony Orchestra
Hector Berlioz composed his autobiographical Episode in the
Life of an Artist in the spring of 1830, while he was still a stu-
dent at the Paris Conservatory. The work is in two parts: the
Symphonie Fantastique and Lélio, or The Return to Life, a
“lyric monodrama.”’ Orchestrally, Berlioz was years ahead of
bis time when he wrote the Svmphonie Fantastique. He set
the pattern for imaginative and brilliant orchestral sounds that
seem more valid in the twentieth century than in the nineteenth.
How the composer would have revelled if he could have heard
the perfect fidelity with which his advanced ideas have been
reproduced on Everest Records. This is a miracle of sound be-
yond even the far-seeing mind of Berlioz.
There were two underlying factors which caused the roman-
tic young Berlioz to write his. Fantastic Symphony. The first
was his recent acquaintance with Goethe’s Faust, which he had
read ina French translation. Two years earlier, he had com-
posed Eight Scenes from Faust (an unsuccessful work, parts ©
of which were later used in his: dramatic oratorio The Damna-
tion of Faust) and a Faust ballet.
The second — and more important — influence behind the
eomposition of the symphony was Berlioz’s uncontrollable pas-
sion for the Irish actress, Henrietta Smithson. He had first seen
her in 1827, when she appeared with an English company in
Shakespeare’s [Jamlet.and Romeo and Juliet, and he had im-
mediately fallen head over heels in love with her. Miss Smith-
son, on the other hand, not only had never met her admirer but
had not even heard of his. existence. In an attempt to attract
her attention, Berlioz, at great personal expense, arranged and
presented a concert of ‘his own works at the conservatory. But
the lady of his dreams was occupied elsewhere and knew noth-
ing of the event. Then he began bombarding her with letters
until, becoming alarmed, she ordered her maid to refuse to
accept any more when they were delivered. Finally he wrote
the symphony as a last great outpouring of his emotions.
In the meantime,“Berlioz had won the prix de Rome for his
Cantata Sardanapale. Before departing for Italy for the year of
residence, study and work which the award carries with it, he
arranged’a concert at the Conservatory, at which the cantata
and the Symphonie Fantastique were given their premieres.
The concert, which took place on December 5, 1830, was con-
ducted by Francois Habeneck, and was a great success. Once
again, however, Miss Smithson did not attend. At a second per-
formance, also conducted by Habeneck at the Conservatory, on
December 9, 1832, she did make her appearance; but she was
the only member of the audience who, by this time, did not
know that it was she who was the central figure of the sym-
phony’s program. When she came to realize the truth, she met
the composer, and the two were ultimately married. By this
time, however, her popularity had waned, and she had lost her
graceful carriage as the result of an accident. Unfortunately,
the story does not have a happy ending; the marriage did not
work out successfully. The two were separated, and Mme. Ber-
lioz died in poverty in Montmartre in March, 1854. ‘The follow-
ing October, Berlioz remarried.
When the score of the Fantastic Symphony was published in
1845, it carried the following program notes by the composer:
“A young musician of unhealthily sensitive nature and en-
dowed with vivid imagination has poisoned himself with opium
in a paroxysm of lovesick despair. The narcotic dose he had
taken was too weak to cause death, but it has thrown him into
a long sleep accompanied by the most extraordinary visions.
In this condition his sensations, his feelings, and his memories
find utterance in his sick brain in the form of musical imagery.
Even the Beloved One takes the form of a melody in his mind,
like a fixed idea which is ever returning.
-» Also available on Stereo: SDBR 3037 <@
Library of Congress Catalog Number: R 59-1262
“I. Dreams, Passions. At first he thinks of the uneasy and
nervous condition of his mind, of sombre longings, of depression
and joyous elation without any recognizable cause, which he
experienced before the Beloved One had appeared to him.
Then he remembers the ardent love with which she suddenly
inspired him; he thinks of his almost insane anxiety of mind, of
his raging jealousy, of his reawakening love, of his religious
consolation.
‘JJ. A Ball. In a ballroom, amidst the confusion of a bril-
liant festival, he finds the Beloved One again.
“III. Scene in the Fields. It is a summer evening. He is in
the country, musing, when he hears two shepherd lads who
play, in alternation, the ranz des vaches (the tune used by the
Swiss shepherds to call their flocks). This pastoral duet, the
quiet scene, the soft whisperings of the trees stirred by the
zephyr-wind, some prospects of hope recently made known to
pose to his heart and to lend a smiling color to his imagination.
And then She appears once more. His heart stops beating, pain-
ful forebodings fill his soul. ‘Should She prove false to him!’
him. all these sensations unite to impart a long unknown re-
One of the shepherds resumes the melody, but the other an- :
swers him no more... Sunset . . . distant rolling of thunder . .
loneliness ... silence...
“IV. March to the Scaffold. He dreams that he murdered
his Beloved, that he has been condemned to death and is being
led to execution. A march that is alternately sombre and wild, -
brilliant and solemn, accompanies the procession....The °
tumultuous outbursts are followed without modulation by
measured steps. The fixed idea returns for a moment a last
thought of love is revived—which is cut short by the death-blow.
“VY. Dream of a Witches’ Sabbath. He dreams that he is
present at a witches’ revel, surrounded by horrible spirits, —
amidst sorcerers and monsters in many fearful forms, who.
have come together for his funeral. Strange sounds, groans,
shrill laughter, distant yells, which other cries seem to answer.
The Beloved Melody is heard again, but it has lost.its shy and
noble character: it has become a vulgar, trivial, grotesque dance
tune. She it is who comes to attend the witches’ meeting.
Riotous howls and shouts greet her arrival....She joins the
infernal orgy ... bells toll for the dead ...a burlesque parody
of the Dies irae...the Witches’ round dance...The dance
and the Dies irae are heard together.”
As a number of commentators have pointed out, Berlioz
made his program to fit the music, not vice versa, as is usually
the case. Most of the music for the Symphonie Fantastique was
compiled from his earlier compositions. First of all, the idée fixe
_the “fixed idea’’— which is the theme of the Beloved One,
was originally written for an earlier love, Estelle Gautier. It
may be noted that Berlioz started his love affairs at an early
age; Mlle. Gautier was eighteen, but the composer was only
twelve! This theme was also used in a student cantata
Hermione. The March to the Scaffold was taken in its entirety
from Berlioz’s unfinished opera Les Francs Juges (The Judges
of the Secret Court), which also yielded the music for the
Scene in the Fields. A Ball and The Witches’ Sabbath are
believed to have stemmed from his Faust ballet.
Since Berlioz was among the more romantic of the romantic
school of composers, it is not surprising that he should have
affixed such an elaborate program to his symphony. For he was
not only interested in attracting the attention of Henrietta
Smithson, he wanted to attract the public as well. In his ad-
mirable program notes on the Fantastic Symphony for the
San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, Alfred Frankenstein calls
Berlioz “one of the best publicity agents in history,” and his
programmatic outline for the symphony “his longest and most
elaborate press-release.”
Notes by PAUL AFFELDER
RIAA CURVE
RUMENT CORPORATION ¢ PRINTED IN U.S.A. e *T.M. © ©1959 BELOCK INSTRUMENT CORP.
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