[Listening extract audio not available in printed QP] You hear an extract from 'An Episode in the Life of an Artist'. A recurring melody represents the belo...

(a) Type of orchestral work that follows a programme across multiple movements [1]

The answer is programme symphony. A programme symphony is a multi-movement orchestral work in which each movement depicts a specific scene, event or emotion described in a written programme (narrative). Unlike a symphonic poem, which is a single continuous movement, the programme symphony retains the multi-movement structure of the Classical symphony while adding an extra-musical storyline.

Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique (subtitled An Episode in the Life of an Artist, 1830) is the most famous example. Its five movements depict scenes from the artist's obsessive love, including a ball, a pastoral scene, a march to the scaffold and a witches' sabbath.

(b) Berlioz's term for the recurring melody [1]

The answer is idee fixe (fixed idea). This is a melody that represents the beloved woman and recurs throughout all five movements of the symphony, transformed each time to reflect the changing dramatic situation. In the ball scene it appears in a graceful waltz form; in the march to the scaffold it is cut short by a guillotine blow.

The idee fixe is an early forerunner of Wagner's leitmotif technique, though Berlioz applies it specifically to a single character across a multi-movement work rather than to many characters within a continuous drama.