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A reappraisal of the French composer on the 150th anniversary of his death. Part of Berlioz – the Ultimate Romantic.

Tom Service meets conductors, performers and biographers to explore the strange powers and imaginative visions in the music of Hector Berlioz.

Including Sir John Eliot Gardiner, one of the UK's biggest champions for Berlioz and his music, on his own relationship with the music and on his pioneering work with the Orchestre Revolutionnaire et Romantique. Tom also meets two of the ORR's players, horn player Anneke Scott and cellist Robin Michael.

The conductor Nicholas Collon joins Tom to examine Berlioz's extraordinary use of structure and harmony in Symphonie Fantastique, also revealing an out of body experience he had whilst playing the symphony as a member of the National Youth Orchestra.

Tom also meets David Cairns, one of the most influential Berlioz biographers of recent times, and talks to Bruno Messina, who directs the Festival Berlioz in his and the composer's home town in South West France, and is the author of a new French biography.

Plus Chi-Chi Nwanoku on the rare and extraordinary Octobass. soprano Carolyn Sampson on singing Les Nuit d'Ete, and the musician and researcher Carmel Raz on Berlioz's interest in neurophysiology and the effects of music, and how he used it in his music.