NOTE by arr. Henkel
15-part version - This arrangement was specifically written for the 50th anniversary of the International Trumpet Guild: Festival of Trumpets. All parts are for b-flat trumpet.
8-part version - This is a modified version of the 15-part version that is appropriate for an 8-part trumpet ensemble. The ensemble is: piccolo trumpet, 5 b-flat trumpet parts, 2 flugelhorn parts
PROGRAM NOTE by Berlioz
Berlioz wrote these program notes for the fourth movement, March to the Scaffold:
Convinced that his love is unappreciated, the artist poisons himself with opium. The dose of narcotic, while too weak to cause his death, plunges him into a heavy sleep accompanied by the strangest of visions. He dreams that he has killed his beloved, that he is condemned, led to the scaffold and is witnessing his own execution. As he cries for forgiveness the effects of the narcotic set in. He wants to hide but he cannot, so he watches as an onlooker as he dies. The procession advances to the sound of a march that is sometimes sombre and wild, and sometimes brilliant and solemn, in which a dull sound of heavy footsteps follows without transition the loudest outbursts. At the end of the march, the first four bars of the idée fixe reappear like a final thought of love interrupted by the fatal blow when his head bounces down the steps.
