3 Pieces from The Damnation of Faust

In Goethe’s Faust, which has stimulated the creative imagination of countless composers, there are no will o’ the wisps, no sylphs and no Hungarian soldiers. Berlioz, however, was not at all apologetic about inventing episodes for will o’ the wisps, sylphs and Hungarian soldiers, all with appropriate music, in his “dramatic legend,” The Damnation of Faust, which was inspired by Goethe’s monumental two-part drama. The Faust legend – basically the story of a man who sells his soul for immediate access to the pleasures of this world – existed, he pointed out, long before Germany’s greatest poet adopted it. In setting it to music, he was free to treat it in whatever way seemed best from the composer’s point of view, even to the extent of duly delivering his hero to the devil whereas Goethe finally saves him.

At the heart of The Damnation of Faust – and of Part One of Goethe’s drama, although Part Two assumes a very much more philosophical dimension – is Faust’s love for an innocent young girl whom, with the help of Mephistophes, he succeeds in seducing. The Mephistophelean strategy here is to cast a spell on her by staging a Minuet of the Wils o’the wisps in the street outside her home when she is alone with Faust. While it is reassuring in its old-world charm and enchanting in its subtle colour effects, it is at the same time, in the Presto ending, diabolically exciting.

According to Berlioz’s version of the story, Faust first catches sight of Marguerite in a dream summoned up, at the behest of Mephistopheles, by a chorus of gnomes and sylphs. The Ballet of the Sylphs is an exquisitely scored waltz, its melodic line floating effortlessly on first violins over a long-sustained D on cellos and basses. It scarcely ever rises above pp and at the end, as the sylphs disappear into thin air accompanied by the most delicate of harp sounds, the dynamic level falls to pppp and even beyond.

Although The Damnation of Faust achieved phenomenal popularity within a few years of the composer’s death, on its first performances in Paris in 1846 it was a depressing failure. The audience had liked the Hungarian March but, ironically, it was the Hungarian first act that attracted disapproval from some critics as a betrayal of Goethe’s materpiece. Certainly, his Faust never goes anywhere near Hungary. Berlioz’s answer was the frank, even defiant admission that he “wished to introduce a composition, the theme of which is Hungarian.” The composition in question was his arrangement of the Rácóczy-induló which he had selected from a collection of traditional Hungarian tunes for a concert in Pesth earlier in the year. On that occasion it had roused the audience to an extraordinary pitch of national fervour. Given a new ending, which drives an already extravagant arrangement to somewhere not far from over the top, it was immediately encored in Paris too.

In Goethe’s Faust, which has stimulated the creative imagination of countless composers, there are no will o’ the wisps, no sylphs and no Hungarian soldiers. Berlioz, however, was not at all apologetic about inventing episodes for will o’ the wisps, sylphs and Hungarian soldiers, all with appropriate music, in his “dramatic legend,” The Damnation of Faust, which was inspired by Goethe’s monumental two-part drama. The Faust legend – basically the story of a man who sells his soul for immediate access to the pleasures of this world – existed, he pointed out, long before Germany’s greatest poet adopted it. In setting it to music, he was free to treat it in whatever way seemed best from the composer’s point of view, even to the extent of duly delivering his hero to the devil whereas Goethe finally saves him.

Although The Damnation of Faust achieved phenomenal popularity within a few years of the composer’s death, on its first performances in Paris in 1846 it was a depressing failure. The audience had liked the Hungarian March but, ironically, it was the Hungarian first act that attracted disapproval from some critics as a betrayal of Goethe’s materpiece. Certainly, his Faust never goes anywhere near Hungary. Berlioz’s answer was the frank, even defiant admission that he “wished to introduce a composition, the theme of which is Hungarian.” The composition in question was his arrangement of the Rácóczy-induló which he had selected from a collection of traditional Hungarian tunes for a concert in Pesth earlier in the year. On that occasion it had roused the audience to an extraordinary pitch of national fervour. Given a new ending, which drives an already extravagant arrangement to somewhere not far from over the top, it was immediately encored in Paris too.

At the heart of The Damnation of Faust – and of Part One of Goethe’s drama, while Part Two assumes a very much more philosophical dimension – is Faust’s love for an innocent young girl whom, with the help of Mephistophes, he succeeds in seducing. According to Berlioz’s version of the story, Faust first catches sight of Marguerite in a dream summoned up, at the behest of Mephistopheles, by a chorus of gnomes and sylphs. The Ballet of the Sylphs is an exquisitely scored waltz, its melodic line floating effortlessly on first violins over a long-sustained D on cellos and basses. It scarcely ever rises above pp and at the end, as the sylphs disappear into thin air accompanied by the most delicate of harp sounds, the dynamic level falls to pppp and even beyond.

The Mephistophelean strategy in the seduction of Marguerite is to cast a spell on her by staging a Minuet of the Wils o’the wisps in the street outside her home when she is alone with Faust. While it is reassuring in its old-world charm and enchanting in its subtle colour effects, it is at the same time, in the Presto ending, diabolically exciting.