After the second performance of the Symphonie fantastique on 9 December 1832 Berlioz was accosted by “a man with flowing hair, piercing eyes and a strange ravaged countenance, a creature haunted by genius” as he was leaving the hall, and embraced him, saying with a deliberate emphasis: “Monsieur, you start off where others finish”. That was Paganini, who was again present at Berlioz's concert a year later, after which he called on the composer and asked him to write a work for him to play on the Stradivarius viola he had recently acquired. Soon the concept of the work as a dramatic fantasy for orchestra with solo viola was in Berlioz's mind, though the specific character of Byron's Childe Harold only came later; originally the idea was to call the work The Last Moments of Mary Stuart, and there was in addition to be a chorus. But this did not suit Paganini at all; at the sight of so many rests in the viola part he exclaimed: “That's no good. There's not enough for me to do here. I should be playing all the time”, and indeed in the event he made excuses and did not play it. But he was present at a subsequent performance, on 16 December 1838; and on this occasion, the first time he had heard the work, he made the most handsome amends: he came up on to the platform with his 12-year-old son Achille, who interpreted for him (for cancer of the throat had made his voice almost inaudible), and accosted Berlioz as he was going backstage. The boy interpreted to Berlioz: “My father says he is so moved and overwhelmed, he could go down on his knees to you”, and drawing Berlioz back to the platform where the musicians were packing up their instruments, he indeed knelt and kissed his hand. Two days later Achille put his head round Berlioz's door, handed him a note, and disappeared. Berlioz opened it and read: “Beethoven being dead, only Berlioz could make him live again; and I, who have enjoyed your divine compositions …”, and enclosing a wildly extravagant cheque for 20,000 francs (L800 then, L80,000 now) which led to the composition of Roméo et Juliette and its dedication to Paganini in gratitude. The story is told in Cairns 1999:31–2, 172–3.

sources

A  Autograph score (1834), in the Bibliotheque nationale de France, Paris