EXPLORING MUSIC: The Romantics BERLIOZ: (ii) The Mature Years A talk illustrated with fine CD recordings by Adrian Boynton Berlioz’s Requiem is on a huge scale. It calls for 16 timpani, and brass bands in the four corners of the church! Yet in some ways it is an intimate piece, and there are moments of exceptional beauty. The dramatic symphony ’Romeo and Juliet’ (which greatly impressed Wagner) is full of delightful moments that wonderfully capture the atmosphere of the play. Two works of 1854 reflect different aspect of Berlioz’s art - the ceremonial ’Te Deum’, very much in the grand manner, and the gentle, homely oratorio ’L’Enfance du Christ’. His last two compositions also offer striking contrasts. The Shakespearian comic opera ’Beatrice and Bénédict’, and the great epic ’The Trojans’, a work of immense proportions, drawing together many of the creative threads from Berlioz’s life.