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Abstract
[...]the College Band Directors National Association Report only lists twenty full performances
and nine partial ones of Symphonie funèbre between 1984 and 2020.2 While some may have
relegated Symphonie funèbre to the dustbin of history, its popularity and importance during
Berlioz's lifetime is impossible to deny. [...]on February 5, 1842, Richard Wagner wrote to
Robert Schumann after attending a performance of the piece earlier that week: Not long ago
[Berlioz] gave a concert which systematically drove people insane. The form and ensemble were
left up to the composer for which he chose an older, patriotic style most often associated with the
French Revolution and the music of François-Joseph Gossec, Luigi Cherubini, Étienne Méhul,
and his teacher Jean-François Le Sueur: I thought that the simplest plan would be best for such a
work, and that a large body of wind instruments would alone be suitable for a symphony which
was-at least on the first occasion-to be heard in the open air. [...]the stylistic intent of each
movement is dictated by the ceremony itself which also informs musical decision-making at
multiple structural levels including form, melody, and harmony.