15, is the fourth and last symphony by the French composer Hector Berlioz, first performed on 28 July 1840 in Paris.

Berlioz had little sympathy for the régime, but welcomed the opportunity to write the work because the government had offered him 10,000 francs for it.

The Symphonie militaire (later renamed Symphonie funèbre et triomphale), rather than following the model Berlioz had established in Romeo and Juliet, represents a reversion to an earlier pre-Beethovenian style in the tradition of monumental French public ceremonial music.

[1] Berlioz claimed to have completed the entire score in just 40 hours,[2] harvesting much of the musical material for this Grande symphonie funèbre et triomphale from unfinished works.

The first movement, the "Marche funèbre", was constructed from the Fête musicale funèbre à la mémoire des hommes illustres de la France, a massive, seven-movement ceremonial piece begun in 1835 in the hopes of selling it to the French government.

According to Julian Rushton, "Berlioz worked best on large projects; when he could see no future for them he preferred not to compose.

The Funereal and Triumphal Symphony was originally scored for a military band of 200 players marching in the procession accompanying the remains of those who had died fighting in the 1830 revolution on their way to reinterment beneath a memorial column erected on the site of the Bastille.

On the day of the parade, little of the 3rd movement could be heard over the cheering crowds on the column when the ceremony was about to end as it was about to be reprised while the 1st and 3rd movements were heard during the procession and the 2nd during the dedication proper; but the work was such a success at the dress rehearsal that it was performed twice more in August and became one of the composer's most popular works during his lifetime.

[4] Berlioz revised the score in January 1842, adding an optional part for strings and a final chorus to a text by Antony Deschamps.

On 5 February, he told Robert Schumann that he found passages in the last movement of Berlioz's symphony so "magnificent and sublime that they can never be surpassed.

Berlioz commissioned Antony Deschamps in 1842 to provide lyrics to be sung by choirs at the end of the final (Apothéose) movement of the symphony.

Changez, nobles guerriers, tous vos lauriers, Pour des palmes immortelles!

Berlioz scored the symphony for a large military band with optional choir and string instruments.