1841—Paris, France

Hector Berlioz, in a review of Alexandre Montfort’s opera-comique La jeunesse de Charles-Quint, complains about contemporary use of the trombone: “The craze for the bass drum began to recede a few months ago, but the trombone craze is on the rise. Just when we were learning to admire the magnificent orchestration of Der Freischütz, where Weber uses the trombones only three or four times and with remarkable reserve, those hounds started barking, howling and bellowing at the Opéra Comique in the middle of a love duet or a comic ensemble.” Berlioz goes on to fault a Mass by Dietsch for “using trombones to reinforce the orchestra without any regard for their tone, which disqualifies them from the appropriate style of so many pieces. Let them mutter a solemn prayer in the Kyrie or blaze away with fanfares in the Iterum venturus, but…. So this is where the art of instrumentation now stands! If hearing the chorus of furies in Iphigénie en Tauride or the entrance of the Commendatore in Don Giovanni or the nuns’ orgy in Robert le diable, would you not? But no, it is M. Petipa or M. Mabille stepping on stage to dance a… pas de deux…. At the Opéra Comique an old chap is upset at losing his snuffbox—three trombones! He rejoices when he finds it—three trombones! A blind man drinks a glass of cheap wine—three trombones! A stable lad tightens some layabout’s belt—three trombones! Every time!” (Macdonald 225).