Berlioz and Schumann | Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra

‘Drums and trumpets in C have been blaring in my head,’ wrote Robert Schumann in 1845, ‘I have no idea what will come of it.’ What came of it was the symphony we know as Schumann’s Second – a defiant, joyous and spiritually uplifting work that shared its key, its power and its rigour with the ‘Great’ symphony by Schubert (heard 15 December) that helped inspire it. Before Schumann’s symphony Ryan Wigglesworth and Sophie Bevan delve into the extraordinary musical imagination of Hector Berlioz courtesy of the thrilling overture to his Shakespearean opera and his delectable songs on the theme of love passionate, unrequited and lost.