Editing Hector Berlioz (section)

===1821–1824: Medical student===
In March 1821 Berlioz passed the [[baccalauréat]] examination at the [[Université Grenoble Alpes|University of Grenoble]] – it is not certain whether at the first or second attempt<ref>Cairns (2000), pp. 87–88</ref> – and in late September, aged seventeen, he moved to Paris. At his father's insistence he enrolled at the School of Medicine of the [[University of Paris]].<ref>Bloom (2000), p. xv; and Cairns (2000), p. 101</ref> He had to fight hard to overcome his revulsion at dissecting bodies, but in deference to his father's wishes, he forced himself to continue his medical studies.<ref>Holoman (1989), p. 19</ref>

[[File:Vue de la nouvelle salle de l'Opéra prise de la rue de Provence - NYPL Digital Collections.jpg|thumb|left|upright=1.25|alt=exterior of old building in neo-classical style|The [[Paris Opera|Opéra]], in the [[Salle Le Peletier|Rue le Peletier]], Paris, c.{{space}}1821]]
The horrors of the medical college were mitigated thanks to an ample allowance from his father, which enabled him to take full advantage of the cultural, and particularly musical, life of Paris. Music did not at that time enjoy the prestige of literature in French culture,<ref name=grove/> but Paris nonetheless possessed two major opera houses and the country's most important music library.<ref>Anderson, Gordon A., ''et al''. [http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000040089 "Paris"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181011133749/http://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000040089 |date=11 October 2018 }}, ''Grove Music Online'', Oxford University Press, 2001. Retrieved 19 October 2018. {{subscription}}</ref> Berlioz took advantage of them all. Within days of arriving in Paris he went to the [[Paris Opera|Opéra]], and although the piece on offer was by a minor composer, the staging and the magnificent orchestral playing enchanted him.{{refn|The opera was ''[[Les Danaïdes]]'' by [[Antonio Salieri]].<ref>Holoman (1989), p. 20</ref> |group= n}} He went to other works at the Opéra and the [[Opéra-Comique]]; at the former, three weeks after his arrival, he saw [[Gluck]]'s ''[[Iphigénie en Tauride]]'', which thrilled him. He was particularly inspired by Gluck's use of the orchestra to carry the drama along. A later performance of the same work at the Opéra convinced him that his vocation was to be a composer.<ref>Cairns (2000), p. 106</ref>

The dominance of Italian opera in Paris, against which Berlioz later campaigned, was still in the future,<ref name=ba41>Barzun, p. 41</ref> and at the opera houses he heard and absorbed the works of [[Étienne Méhul]] and [[François-Adrien Boieldieu]], other operas written in the French style by foreign composers, particularly [[Gaspare Spontini]], and above all five operas by Gluck.<ref name=ba41/>{{refn|The Gluck operas were ''[[Armide (Gluck)|Armide]]'', ''[[Orfeo ed Euridice#Gluck's 1774 Paris Opera version|Orphée et Euridice]]'', ''[[Alceste (Gluck)|Alceste]]'', ''[[Iphigénie en Aulide]]'' and ''[[Iphigénie en Tauride]]''.<ref name=ba41/>|group= n}} He began to visit the [[Conservatoire de Paris|Paris Conservatoire]] library in between his medical studies, seeking out [[sheet music|scores]] of Gluck's operas and making copies of parts of them.<ref>Cairns (2000), p. 112</ref> By the end of 1822 he felt that his attempts to learn composition needed to be augmented with formal tuition, and he approached [[Jean-François Le Sueur]], director of the Royal Chapel and professor at the Conservatoire, who accepted him as a private pupil.<ref>Holoman (1989), pp. 25–27</ref>

In August 1823 Berlioz made the first of many contributions to the musical press: a letter to the journal ''Le Corsaire'' defending French opera against the incursions of its Italian rival.<ref>Barzun, p. 47</ref> He contended that all [[Gioachino Rossini|Rossini]]'s operas put together could not stand comparison with even a few bars of those of Gluck, Spontini or Le Sueur.<ref>Letter published 12 August 1823, ''quoted'' in Cairns (2000), p. 130</ref> By now he had composed several works including ''Estelle et Némorin'' and ''Le Passage de la mer Rouge'' (The Crossing of the Red Sea) – both since lost.<ref name=bxv>Bloom (2000), p. xv</ref>

In 1824 Berlioz graduated from medical school,<ref name=bxv/> after which he abandoned medicine, to the strong disapproval of his parents. His father suggested law as an alternative profession and refused to countenance music as a career.<ref>Cairns (2000), p. 119</ref>{{refn|Barzun suggests that his father might have been more sympathetic but for his mother's zealous religious conviction that all players and artists were doomed to damnation.<ref>Barzun, p. 49</ref>|group= n}} He reduced and sometimes withheld his son's allowance, and Berlioz went through some years of financial hardship.<ref name=grove/>