Arnold Schoenberg, Los Angeles, 1948
Arnold Schoenberg (the anglicized form of Schönberg — Schoenberg changed the spelling officially when he left
Germany and re-converted to Judaism in 1933; September 13,
1874 – July 13, 1951) was an
Austrian and later American composer. Many of Schoenberg's works are associated with the expressionist movements in early 20th-century German poetry and art, and he was among the first composers
to embrace atonal motivic development.
Schoenberg is best known as the innovator in the 1920s of the twelve-tone
technique, a compositional technique involving tone rows. He was also a painter, an
important music theorist, and an influential teacher of composition.
Biography
Arnold Schönberg was born to an Ashkenazi Jewish family
in the Leopoldstadt district (in earlier times a Jewish ghetto) in Vienna, at "Obere Donaustraße 5" Although his mother Pauline, a native of Prague, was a piano teacher (his father Samuel, a native of Bratislava, was a shopkeeper), Arnold was largely self-taught, taking
only counterpoint lessons with the composer Alexander von Zemlinsky, who was to become his first brother-in-law (Beaumont 2000, 87). In his
twenties, he lived by orchestrating operettas while composing works such as the string sextet
Verklärte Nacht ("Transfigured Night") in 1899. He
later made an orchestral version of this, which has come to be one of his most popular pieces.
Both Richard Strauss and Gustav Mahler recognized
Schoenberg's significance as a composer, Strauss when he encountered Schoenberg's Gurre-Lieder, and Mahler after hearing several of Schoenberg's early works. Strauss turned to a more
conservative idiom in his own work after 1909 and at that point dismissed Schoenberg, but Mahler adopted Schoenberg as a protégé
and continued to support him even after Schoenberg's style reached a point which Mahler could no longer understand, and Mahler
worried about who would look after him after his death. Schoenberg, who had initially despised and mocked Mahler's music, was
converted by the "thunderbolt" of Mahler's 3rd symphony, which he considered a work of genius, and afterwards "even spoke of
Mahler as a saint" (Stuckenschmidt 1977, 103; Schoenberg 1975, 136). Despite his Jewish background, in 1898 he converted to
Lutheranism. He would remain Lutheran until 1933.
Schoenberg began teaching harmony, counterpoint and composition in 1904, using Heinrich
Bellermann's treatise 'Counterpoint' as his text. His first students were Paul Pisk,
Anton Webern, and Alban Berg; Webern and Berg would
become the most famous of his many pupils.
The summer of 1908, during which his wife Mathilde left him for several months for a young Austrian painter, Richard Gerstl (who committed suicide after her return to her husband
and children), marked a distinct change in Schoenberg's work. It was during the absence of his wife that he composed "You lean
against a silver-willow" (German: Du lehnest wider eine Silberweide), the
thirteenth song in the cycle Das Buch der Hängenden Gärten, op. 15, and the first piece without any reference at all to a
key (Stuckenschmidt 1977, 96). Also in this year he completed one of his most revolutionary compositions, the String Quartet No. 2, whose first two movements, though chromatic in color, use
traditional key signatures, yet whose final two movements, settings of poems by the German mystical poet Stefan George, weaken the links with traditional tonality daringly (though both movements end on tonic
chords, and the work is not yet fully non-tonal) and, breaking with previous string-quartet practice, incorporate a soprano vocal
line.
During the summer of 1910, Schoenberg wrote his Harmonielehre (Theory of Harmony, Schoenberg 1922), which to
this day remains one of the most influential music-theory books.
Another of his most important works from this atonal or pantonal period is the highly influential Pierrot Lunaire, op. 21, of 1912, a novel cycle of expressionist songs set to a German translation
of poems by the Belgian-French poet Albert Giraud. Utilizing the technique of
Sprechstimme, or speak-singing recitation, the work pairs a female singer with a small
ensemble of 5 musicians. The ensemble, which is now commonly referred to as the Pierrot ensemble,
consists of flute (doubling on piccolo), clarinet (doubling on bass clarinet), violin (doubling on viola), violoncello, speaker-singer, and piano. In recent years, other composers have modified the ensemble to include percussion, which often replaces the singer.[citation needed]
Later, Schoenberg was to develop the most influential version of the dodecaphonic (also known as twelve-tone) method of composition, which in French and English was given the alternative name
serialism by René Leibowitz and Humphrey Searle in 1947. This technique was taken up by many of his students, who constituted the
so-called Second Viennese School. They included Anton Webern, Alban Berg and Hanns
Eisler, all of whom were profoundly influenced by Schoenberg. He excelled as a teacher of music (teaching students such as
John Cage), partly through his method of engaging with, analyzing, and transmitting the
methods of the great classical composers, especially Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms, partly through his focus on bringing out the musical and compositional individuality of his
students.[citation needed] He published a number of
books, ranging from his famous Harmonielehre (Theory of Harmony) to Fundamentals of Musical Composition (Schoenberg
1967), many of which are still in print and still used by musicians and developing composers.
Following the 1924 death of composer Ferruccio Busoni, who had served as Director of
a Master Class in Composition at the Prussian Academy of Arts in Berlin, Schoenberg was appointed to this post the next year, but because of health reasons was unable to take up
his post until 1926. Anti-Semitic attacks in the Zeitschrift für Musik swiftly
ensued.[citation needed] Among his notable students
during this period were the composers Roberto Gerhard, Nikos Skalkottas, and Josef Rufer. Schoenberg continued in his post
until the election of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis in 1933,
when he was dismissed and forced into exile. He emigrated to Paris, where he
reaffirmed his Jewish faith[1] and then to
the United States. His first teaching position in the United States was at the
Malkin Conservatory in Boston. He was then wooed to Los
Angeles, where he taught at the University of Southern
California and the University of California, Los Angeles,
both of which later named a music building on their respective campuses Schoenberg Hall.[2][3] He settled in
Brentwood Park, where he befriended fellow composer (and tennis
partner) George Gershwin and began teaching at University of California, Los Angeles, where he resided for the rest of his
life.
During this final period he composed several notable works, including the difficult Violin Concerto, op. 36 (1934/36), the Kol
Nidre, op. 39, for chorus and orchestra (1938), the Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte, op. 41 (1942), the haunting
Piano Concerto, op. 42 (1942), and his memorial to the victims of the
Holocaust, A Survivor from Warsaw, op. 46 (1947). He was unable to
complete his opera Moses und Aron (1932/33), which was one of the first works of
its genre to be written completely using dodecaphonic composition. In 1941, he
became a naturalized citizen of the United States.
Schoenberg experienced triskaidekaphobia (the fear of the number 13), which
possibly began in 1908 with the composition of op. 15, no. 13 (Stuckenschmidt 1977, 96). Moses und Aron was originally
spelled Moses und Aaron, but when he realised this contained 13 letters, he changed it. His superstitious nature may have
triggered his death. According to friend Katia Mann, he feared he would die during a year that was a multiple of 13[1]. He so dreaded his sixty-fifth birthday in 1939 that a friend
asked the composer and astrologer Dane Rudhyar to
prepare Schoenberg's horoscope. Rudhyar did this and told Schoenberg that the year was
dangerous, but not fatal. But in 1950, on his seventy-sixth birthday, the Viennese musician and astrologer Oskar Adler wrote Schoenberg a note warning him that the year was a critical one: 7 + 6 = 13[2]. This stunned and depressed the composer, for up to that point
he had only been wary of multiples of 13 and never considered adding the digits of his age. He became obsessed with this idea and
many friends report that he frequently said: "If I can only pull through this year I shall be safe."[3] On Friday, July 13, 1951, Schoenberg stayed in bed — sick, anxious and depressed.
In a letter to Schoenberg's sister Ottilie, dated 4 August 1951, his wife, Gertrud, reported "About a quarter to twelve I looked
at the clock and said to myself: another quarter of an hour and then the worst is over. Then the doctor called me. Arnold's
throat rattled twice, his heart gave a powerful beat and that was the end" (Stuckenschmidt 1977, 521). Gertrud Schoenberg
reported the next day in a telegram to her sister-in-law Ottilie that Arnold died at 11:45pm (Stuckenschmidt 1977, 520).
Arnold Schoenberg was grandfather of the lawyer E. Randol Schoenberg. His
daughter, Nuria Dorothea, married fellow composer Luigi Nono in 1955.
Music
Works and ideas
To understand why Schoenberg composed the music that he did, it is useful to begin with his own statement: "Had times been
'normal' (before and after 1914) then the music of our time would have been very
different."[citation needed]
Schoenberg was passionately committed to the concept of unshaken adherence to an "Idea" (such as the concept of an
inexpressible God) and the pursuance of Truth. He saw the development of music accelerating through the works of Wagner, Strauss
and Mahler to a state of saturation. If music was to regain a genuine and valid simplicity of expression, as in the music of his
beloved Mozart and Schubert, the
language must be renewed.[citation needed]
These were the same years when the Western world developed abstract painting and
psychoanalysis in the same city. Many intellectuals at the time felt that thought had
developed to a point of no return, and that it was no longer possible honestly to go on repeating what had been done
before.[citation needed] Between 1901 (Gurre-Lieder) and 1910
(Five Pieces for Orchestra) his music changed more rapidly than at any
other time.[citation needed] When he had written his String Quartet opus 7 and his Chamber Symphony opus 9, he imagined he had arrived at a
mature personal style which would serve him for the future.[citation needed] But already in the second String Quartet opus 10 and the Drei
Klavierstücke opus 11, he had to admit that the saturation of added notes in harmony had reached a stage when there was no
meaningful difference between consonance and dissonance.[citation needed] For a time Schoenberg's music became very concentrated and elliptical, as
he could see no reason to repeat and develop.[citation needed]World War I brought a crisis in his
development. Military service disrupted his life. He was never able to work uninterrupted or over a period of time, and as a
result he left many unfinished works and undeveloped "beginnings". So, at the age of 42 he found himself in the army. On one
occasion, a superior officer demanded to know if he was "this notorious Schoenberg, then"; Schoenberg replied: "Beg to reports,
sir, yes. . . . Nobody wanted to be, someone had to be, so I let it be me" (Schoenberg 1975, 104) (according to Norman Lebrecht, this is an obvious reference to Schoenberg's apparent "destiny" as the "Emancipator of Dissonance") (Lebrecht 2001).
After the war he worked at evolving a means of order which would enable his musical texture to become simpler and clearer, and
this resulted in the "method of composition with twelve tones" in which the twelve pitches of the octave are regarded as equal,
and no one note or tonality is given the emphasis it occupied in classical harmony. He regarded it as the equivalent in music of
Albert Einstein's discoveries in Physics, and Schoenberg announced it
characteristically, during a walk with his friend Josef Rufer, when he said "I have made a discovery which will ensure the
supremacy of German music for the next hundred years" (Stuckenschmidt 1977, 277).
This remark, much misquoted and misunderstood, was probably made with Schoenberg's customary wry and ironic humour, referring
to the collapse of the dominant political position of the German-speaking world in previous years, and also emphasising his
desire to stand with Bach and Beethoven.[citation needed]
In the following years he produced a series of instrumental and orchestral works showing how his method could produce new
classical music which did not copy the past. The climax was to be an opera Moses und
Aron, of which he wrote over two-thirds but which he was unable to complete, perhaps for psychological reasons. The music
ends at the point where Moses cries out his frustration at being unable to express himself. There is little doubt that by this
time Schoenberg had come to see himself as a kind of prophet too.[citation needed]
When he settled in California, he wrote several works in which he returned
to quasi-tonal harmony, but in a very distinctive way, not simply re-using classical harmony. This was in accordance with his
belief that his music evolved naturally out of the past. One of his sayings was "my music is not really modern, just badly
played."[citation needed]
It is worth noting that Schoenberg was not the only composer (or even the first) to experiment with the systematic use of all
twelve tones. Both the Russian composer Nikolai Roslavets and Schoenberg's fellow
Austrian Josef Matthias Hauer developed their own twelve-tone systems quite
independently at around the same time as Schoenberg, and Charles Ives experimented with
twelve-tone techniques substantially earlier.[citation needed] However, Schoenberg's system was by far the most important and
influential.
Controversies and polemics
After some normal early difficulties, Schoenberg began to win public acceptance, with works such as the tone poem Pelleas
und Melisande at a Berlin performance in 1907, and, especially, at the Vienna première of the Gurrelieder on
13 February 1913, which received an ovation that lasted a
quarter of an hour and Schoenberg was presented with a laurel crown (Rosen 1996, 4; Stuckenschmidt 1977, 184). Much of his work,
however, was not well received. In 1907 his Chamber Symphony No. 1
in E major was premièred. The audience was small, and the reaction to the work lukewarm.[citation needed] When it was played again, however,
in a 31 March 1913 concert which also included works by
Alban Berg, Anton Webern and Alexander von Zemlinsky, thunderous applause contended with hisses and laughter during Webern's
Six Pieces, op. 6. Though Zemlinsky's Four Maeterlinck Songs calmed the audience somewhat, according to a contemporary newspaper
report, after Schoenberg's op. 9 "one could hear the shrill sound of door keys among the violent clapping and in the second
gallery the first fight of the evening began". Later in the concert, during a performance of the Altenberg Lieder by Berg,
fighting broke out after Schoenberg interrupted the performance to threaten removal by the police of any troublemakers
(Stuckenschmidt 1977, 185). Mahler's Kindertotenlieder, which were to have concluded the concert, had to be cancelled
after a police officer was called in (Rosen 1996, 5). Schoenberg's music after 1908 made a break from tonality, which greatly polarised responses to it: his followers and students saw him as one of the most
important figures in music, while critics hated his work, on the whole.[citation needed]
The deteriorating relation between contemporary composers and the public led him to found the Society for Private Musical Performances (Verein für musikalische
Privataufführungen in German) in Vienna in 1918. His aim was grandiose but scarcely egocentric; he sought to provide a forum
in which modern musical compositions could be carefully prepared and rehearsed, and properly performed under conditions protected
from the dictates of fashion and pressures of commerce. From its inception through 1921, when it ended because of economic
reasons, the Society presented 353 performances to paid members, sometimes at the rate of one per week, and during the first year
and a half, Schoenberg did not allow any of his own works to be performed (Rosen 1975, 65). Instead, audiences at the Society's
concerts heard difficult contemporary compositions by Skryabin, Debussy, Mahler, Webern,
Berg, Reger, and other leading figures of early
20th-century music (Rosen 1996, 66).
Schoenberg was said to be a very prickly and difficult man to know and befriend.[citation needed] In one of his letters he said "I
hope you weren't stupid enough to be offended by what I said,"[citation needed] and he rewarded conductors such as Otto
Klemperer who programmed his music by complaining repeatedly that they didn't do more[citation needed]. On the other hand, among those who
are considered his disciples he inspired absolute devotion. Even strongly individualistic composers such as
Alban Berg and Anton Webern displayed an almost slavish
selflessness and willingness to serve him.[citation needed]
Schoenberg's serial technique of composition with 12 notes became one of the most central and polemical issues among American
and European musicians during the mid- to late-20th century. Beginning in the 1940s and continuing to the present day, composers
such as Pierre Boulez, Karlheinz
Stockhausen, Luigi Nono and Milton Babbitt
have extended Schoenberg's legacy in increasingly radical directions. The major cities in the USA (e.g. Los Angeles, NYC, Boston)
have also been hosts for historically significant performances of Schoenberg's music, with advocates such as Babbitt in NYC and
the Franco-American conductor-pianist, Jacques-Louis Monod; including the influence
of Schoenberg's own pupils, who have taught at major American schools (e.g. Leonard Stein at USC, UCLA and CalArts; Richard
Hoffmann at Oberlin; Patricia Carpenter at Columbia; and Leon Kirchner and Earl Kim at
Harvard). Others include performers associated with Schoenberg, who have had a profound influence upon contemporary music
performance practice in the USA (e.g. Louis Krasner, Eugene Lehner and Rudolf Kolisch at the New England Conservatory
of Music; Eduard Steuermann and Felix Galimar at the
Juilliard School). Elsewhere in Europe, the work of Hans Keller, Luigi Rognoni, and René Leibowitz has had a measurable influence in
disseminating Schoenberg's musical legacy outside of Germany and Austria.
Schoenberg was not fond of Igor Stravinsky, and in 1926 wrote a poem titled "Der neue
Klassizismus" (in which he derogates Neoclassicism and obliquely refers to
Stravinsky as "Der kleine Modernsky"), which he used as text for the third of his Drei Satiren, op. 28 (H. C. Schonberg
1970, 503).
Extramusical interests
Sketch of Arnold Schoenberg.
Schoenberg was also a painter of considerable ability, whose pictures were considered good enough to exhibit alongside those
of Franz Marc and Wassily Kandinsky
(Stuckenschmidt 1977, 142), and he wrote extensively: plays and poems, as well as essays not only about music but about politics
and the social/historical situation of the Jewish people.[citation needed] He was also interested in Hopalong
Cassidy films, which Paul Buhle and David Wagner (2002, v–vii) attribute to the films' left-wing screenwriters—a rather odd claim in light of
Schoenberg's statement that he was a bourgeois turned monarchist (Stuckenschmidt 1977, 551–52).
Works
- See also: Category:Compositions by Arnold
Schoenberg
Complete list of compositions with opus numbers
- 2 Gesänge [2 Songs] for baritone, op. 1 (1898)
- 4 Lieder [4 Songs], op. 2 (1899)
- 6 Lieder [6 Songs], op. 3 (1899/1903)
- Verklärte Nacht [Transfigured night], op. 4 (1899)
- Pelleas und Melisande, op. 5 (1902/03)
- 8 Lieder [8 Songs] for soprano, op. 6 (1903/05)
- String Quartet no. 1, D minor, op. 7 (1904/05)
- 6 Lieder [6 Songs] with orchestra, op. 8 (1903/05)
- Kammersymphonie [Chamber symphony] no. 1, E major, op. 9 (1906)
- String Quartet no. 2, F-sharp minor (with Soprano), op. 10
(1907/08)
- Drei Klavierstücke, op. 11 (1909)
- 2 Balladen [2 Ballads], op. 12 (1906)
- Friede auf Erden [Peace on earth], op. 13 (1907)
- 2 Lieder [2 Songs], op. 14 (1907/08)
- 15 Gedichte aus Das Buch der hängenden Gärten [15 Poems from The book of the hanging gardens] by Stefan George, op. 15 (1908/09)
- Fünf Orchesterstücke [5 Pieces for Orchestra], op. 16 (1909)
- Erwartung [Expectation] for Soprano and Orchestra, op. 17 (1909)
- Die glückliche Hand [The lucky hand] for Chorus and Orchestra, op. 18
(1910/13)
- Sechs Kleine Klavierstücke [6 Little piano pieces], op. 19 (1911)
- Herzgewächse [Foliage of the heart] for Soprano, op. 20 (1911)
- Pierrot lunaire, op. 21 (1912)
- 4 Lieder [4 Songs] for Voice and Orchestra, op. 22 (1913/16)
- 5 Stücke [5 Pieces] for Piano, op. 23 (1920/23)
- Serenade, op. 24 (1920/23)
- Suite for Piano, op. 25 (1921/23)
- Wind Quintet, op. 26 (1924)
- 4 Stücke [4 Pieces], op. 27 (1925)
- 3 Satiren [3 Satires], op. 28 (1925/26)
- Suite, op. 29 (1925)
- String Quartet no. 3, op. 30 (1927)
- Variations for Orchestra, op. 31 (1926/28)
- Von heute auf morgen [From today to tomorrow] opera in one act, op. 32
(1928)
- 2 Stücke [2 Pieces] for Piano, op. 33a (1928) & 33b (1931)
- Begleitmusik zu einer Lichtspielszene [Accompanying music to a film scene], op. 34 (1930)
- 6 Stücke [6 Pieces] for Male Chorus, op. 35 (1930)
- Violin Concerto, op. 36 (1934/36)
- String Quartet No. 4, op. 37 (1936)
- Kammersymphonie [Chamber symphony] no. 2, E-flat minor, op. 38 (1906/39)
- Kol nidre for Chorus and Orchestra, op. 39 (1938)
- Variations on a recitative for Organ, op. 40 (1941)
- Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte for Voice, Piano and String Quartet, op. 41 (1942)
- Piano Concerto, op. 42 (1942)
- Theme and variations for Band, op. 43a (1943)
- Theme and variations for Orchestra, op. 43b (1943)
- Prelude to “Genesis” for Chorus and Orchestra, op. 44 (1945)
- String Trio, op. 45 (1946)
- A Survivor from Warsaw, op. 46 (1947)
- Phantasy for Violin and Piano, op. 47 (1949)
- 3 Songs, op. 48 (1933)
- 3 Folksongs, op. 49 (1948)
- Dreimal tausend Jahre [Three times a thousand years], op. 50a (1949)
- Psalm 130 “De profundis”, op. 50b (1950)
- Modern psalm, op. 50c (1950, unfinished)
Works by genre
Operas
Choral works
- Friede auf Erden [Peace on earth], op. 13 (1907)
- 3 Satiren [3 Satires], op. 28 (1925/26)
- 6 Stücke [6 Pieces] for Male Chorus, op. 35 (1930)
- Kol nidre for Chorus and Orchestra, op. 39 (1938)
- Prelude to “Genesis” for Chorus and Orchestra, op. 44 (1945)
- String Trio, op. 45 (1946)
- A Survivor from Warsaw, op. 46 (1947)
- 3 Folksongs, op. 49 (1948)
- Dreimal tausend Jahre [Three times a thousand years], op. 50a (1949)
- Psalm 130 “De profundis”, op. 50b (1950)
- Modern psalm, op. 50c (1950, unfinished)
Unpublished:
- Ei, du Lütte [Oh, you little one] (late 1890s)
- Gurre-Lieder [Songs of Gurre] (1901/11)
- 3 Volksliedsätze [3 Folksong movements] (1929)
- Die Jakobsleiter [Jacob’s ladder] (1917/22, unfinished)
Orchestral works
- Cello Concerto “after Monn’s Concerto in D major for harpsichord” (1932/33)
- Concerto “freely adapted from Handel’s Concerto grosso in B-flat major, op.6, no.7” (1933)
- Suite, G major, for string orchestra (1934)
Chamber works
- untitled work in D minor for Violin and Piano (unknown year)
- Presto, in C major for String Quartet (1894(?))
- String Quartet, in D major (1897)
- Scherzo, in F major, and Trio in a minor for String Quartet, rejected from D major String Quartet (1897)
- Verklärte Nacht [Transfigured night] (string sextet), op. 4 (1899)
- String Quartet no. 1, D minor, op. 7 (1904/05)
- String Quartet no. 2, F-sharp minor (with Soprano), op. 10
(1907/08)
- Die eiserne Brigade [The iron brigade] for Piano Quintet (1916)
- Serenade for nine players, op. 24 (1920/23)
- Weihnachtsmusik [Christmas music] for Piano Quartet (1921)
- Wind Quintet, op. 26 (1924)
- Suite for Three clarinets (E-flat, B-flat, and Bass), Violin, Viola, Violoncello and Piano, op. 29 (1925) (with ossia flute
and bassoon parts substituting for E-flat and Bass clarinet)
- String Quartet no. 3, op. 30 (1927)
- String Quartet No. 4, op. 37 (1936)
- Fanfare on motifs of Die Gurrelieder (11 Brass instruments and Percussion) (1945)
- String Trio, op. 45 (1946)
- Phantasy for Violin and Piano, op. 47 (1949)
Fragments
- Ein Stelldichein [A rendezvous] for Mixed Quintet (1905)
- Sonata for Violin and Piano (1927) (a 43-bar fragment)
Songs
- 2 Gesänge [2 Songs] for baritone, op. 1 (1898)
- 4 Lieder [4 Songs], op. 2 (1899)
- 6 Lieder [6 Songs], op. 3 (1899/1903)
- 8 Lieder [8 Songs] for soprano, op. 6 (1903/05)
- 6 Lieder [6 Songs] with orchestra, op. 8 (1903/05)
- 2 Balladen [2 Ballads], op. 12 (1906)
- 2 Lieder [2 Songs], op. 14 (1907/08)
- 15 Gedichte aus Das Buch der hängenden Gärten [15 Poems from The book of the hanging gardens] by Stefan George, op. 15 (1908/09)
- Herzgewächse [Foliage of the heart] for High Soprano (with harp, celesta & harmonium) op. 20 (1911)
- Pierrot lunaire, op. 21 (1912) (reciter with 5 instruments)
- 4 Lieder [4 Songs] for Voice and Orchestra, op. 22 (1913/16)
- Petrarch-Sonnet from Serenade, op. 24 (1920/23) (bass with 7 instruments)
- Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte for Voice, Piano and String Quartet, op. 41 (1942)
- 3 Songs, op. 48 (1933)
unpublished:
- Am Strande [At the seashore] (1909)
- Die Beiden (Sie trug den Becher in der Hand) [The two (She carried the goblet in her hand)] (1899)
- 8 Brettllieder [8 Cabaret songs] (1901)
- Deinem Blick mich zu bequemen [To submit to your sweet glance] (1903)
- 4 Deutsche Volkslieder [4 German folksongs] (1929)
- Ecloge (Duftreich ist die Erde) [Eclogue (Fragrant is the earth)] (1896/97)
- Gedenken (Es steht sein Bild noch immer da) [Remembrance (His picture is still there)] (1893/1903?)
- Gruss in die Ferne (Dunkelnd über den See) [Hail from afar (Darkened over the sea)] (Aug 1900)
- In hellen Träumen hab’ ich dich oft geschaut [In vivid dreams so oft you appeared to me] (1893)
- 12 erste Lieder [12 First songs] (1893/96)
- Mädchenfrühling (Aprilwind, alle Knospen) [Maiden’s spring (April wind, all abud)] (1897)
- Mädchenlied (Sang ein Bettlerpärlein am Schenkentor) [Maiden’s song (A pair of beggars sang at the giving gate)]
(1897/1900)
- Mailied (Zwischen Weizen und Korn) [May song (Between wheat and grain)]
- Mannesbangen (Du musst nicht meinen) [Men’s worries (You should not...)] (1899)
- Nicht doch! (Mädel, lass das Stricken [But no! (Girl, stop knitting)] (1897)
- Ein Schilflied (Drüben geht die Sonne scheiden) [A bulrush song (Yonder is the sun departing)] (1893)
- Waldesnacht, du wunderkühle [Forest night, so wondrous cool] (1894/96)
- Warum bist du aufgewacht [Why have you awakened] (1893/94)
Keyboard works
- Drei Klavierstücke [3 Pieces] (1894)
- 6 Stücke [6 Pieces] for 4 hands (1896)
- Scherzo (Gesamtausgabe fragment 1) (ca. 1894)
- Leicht, mit einiger Unruhe [Lightly with some restlessness], C-sharp minor (Gesamtausgabe fragment 2) (ca. 1900)
- Langsam [Slowly], A-flat major (Gesamtausgabe fragment 3) (1900/01)
- Wenig bewegt, sehr zart [Calmly, very gentle], B-flat major (Gesamtausgabe fragment 4) (1905/06)
- 2 Stücke [2 Pieces] (Gesamtausgabe fragments 5a & 5b) (1909)
- Stück [Piece] (Gesamtausgabe fragment 6) (1909)
- Stück [Piece] (Gesamtausgabe fragment 7) (1909)
- Stück [Piece] (Gesamtausgabe fragment 8) (ca. 1910)
- Mäßig, aber sehr ausdrucksvoll [Measured, but very expressive] (Gesamtausgabe fragment 9) (March 1918)
- Langsam [Slowly] (Gesamtausgabe fragment 10) (Summer 1920)
- Stück [Piece] (Gesamtausgabe fragment 11) (Summer 1920)
- Langsame Halbe [Slow half-notes], B (Gesamtausgabe fragment 12) (1925)
- Quarter note = mm. 80 (Gesamtausgabe fragment 13) (February 1931)
- Sehr rasch; Adagio [Very fast; Slowly] (Gesamtausgabe fragment 14) (July 1931)
- Andante (Gesamtausgabe fragment 15) (10 October 1931)
- Piece (Gesamtausgabe fragment 16) (after October 1933)
- Moderato (Gesamtausgabe fragment 17) (April 1934?)
- Organ Sonata (fragments) (1941)
Canons
- O daß der Sinnen doch so viele sind! [Oh, the senses are too numerous!] (Bärenreiter I) (April? 1905) (4 voices)
- Wenn der schwer Gedrückte klagt [When the sore oppressed complains] (Bärenreiter II) (April? 1905) (4 voices)
- Wer mit der Welt laufen will [He who wants to run with the world] (for David Bach) (Bärenreiter XXI) (March 1926; July 1934)
(3 voices)
- Canon (Bärenreiter IV) (April 1926) (4 voices)
- Von meinen Steinen [From my stones] (for Erwin Stein) (Bärenreiter V) (December 1926) (4 voices)
- Arnold Schönberg beglückwünschst herzlichst Concert Gebouw [Arnold Schoenberg congratulates the Concert Gebouw
affectionately] (Bärenreiter VI) (March 1928) (5 voices)
- Mirror canon with two free middle voices, A major (Bärenreiter VIII) (April 1931) (4 voices)
- Jedem geht es so [No man can escape] (for Carl Engel) (Bärenreiter XIII) (April 1933; text 1943) (3 voices)
- Mir auch ist es so ergangen [I, too, was not better off] (for Carl Engel) (Bärenreiter XIV) (April 1933; text 1943) (3
voices)
- Perpetual canon, A minor (Bärenreiter XV) (1933) (4 voices)
- Mirror canon, A minor (Bärenreiter XVI) (1933) (4 voices)
- Es ist zu dumm [It is too dumb] (for Rudolph Ganz) (Bärenreiter XXII) (September 1934) (4 voices)
- Man mag über Schönberg denken, wie man will [One might think about Schoenberg any way one wants to] (for Charlotte Dieterle)
(Bärenreiter XXIII) (1935) (4 voices)
- Double canon (Bärenreiter XXV) (1938) (4 voices)
- Mr. Saunders I owe you thanks (for Richard Drake Saunders) (Bärenreiter XXVI) (December 1939) (4 voices)
- I am almost sure, when your nurse will change your diapers (for Artur Rodzinsky on the birth of his son Richard) (Bärenreiter
XXVIII) (March 1945) (4 voices)
- Canon for Thomas Mann on his 70th birthday (Bärenreiter XXIX) (June 1945) (2 violins, viola, violoncello)
- Gravitationszentrum eigenen Sonnensystems [You are the center of gravity of your own solar system] (Bärenreiter XXX) (August
1949) (4 voices)
Transcriptions and arrangements
- Bach: Chorale prelude Schmücke dich, o liebe Seele [Deck thyself, oh
dear soul], BWV 654 (arr. 1922: orchestra)
- Bach: Chorale prelude Komm, Gott, Schöpfer, heiliger Geist [Come, God, Creator, Holy ghost], BWV 631 (arr. 1922:
orchestra)
- Bach: Prelude and fugue in E-flat major “St Anne”, BWV 552 (arr. 1928: orchestra)
- Brahms: Piano quartet in G minor, Op. 25 (arr. 1937: orchestra)
- Denza: Funiculì, Funiculà (arr. 1921:
voice, clarinet, mandolin, guitar, violin, viola, violoncello)
- Mahler: Das Lied von der Erde
[The Song of the Earth] (arr. Arnold Schoenberg & Anton Webern, 1921; completed by Rainer Riehn, 1983: soprano, flute &
piccolo, oboe & English horn, clarinet, bassoon & contra-bassoon, horn, harmonium, piano, 2 violins, viola, violoncello,
double bass)
- Mahler: Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen [Songs of a Wayfarer]
(arr. Arnold Schoenberg, 1920: voice, flute, clarinet, harmonium, piano, 2 violins, viola, violoncello, double bass,
percussion)
- Monn: Concerto for cello in G minor, transcribed and adapted from Monn’s
Concerto for harpsichord (1932/33)
- Reger: Eine romantische Suite [A Romantic Suite], Op. 125 (arr. Arnold Schoenberg
& Rudolf Kolisch, 1919/1920: flute, clarinet, 2 violins, viola, violoncello, harmonium 4 hands, piano 4 hands)
- Schubert: Rosamunde, Fürstin von Zypern
Incidental music, D. 797 (arr. Arnold Schoenberg, 1903?: piano 4 hands)
- Schubert: Ständchen [Serenade], D. 889 (arr. Arnold Schoenberg (1921) (voice,
clarinet, bassoon, mandolin, guitar, 2 violins, viola, violoncello))
- Sioly: Weil i a alter Drahrer bin [For I’m a real old gadabout] (arr. 1921: clarinet,
mandolin, guitar, violin, viola, violoncello)
- Johann Strauss II: Kaiser-Walzer
[Emperor Waltz], Op. 437 (arr. 1925: flute, clarinet, 2 violins, viola, violoncello, piano)
- Johann Strauss II: Rosen aus dem Süden [Roses from the South], Op. 388
(arr. 1921: harmonium, piano, 2 violins, viola, violoncello)
Quotes
- "My music is not modern, it is merely badly played."
- "My works are 12-tone compositions, not 12-tone compositions" (Stuckenschmidt 1977, 349).
- "I was never revolutionary. The only revolutionary in our time was Strauss!" (Schoenberg 1975, 137)
Footnotes
- ^ Katia Mann, Unwritten Memories (1971), quoted in Norman Lebrecht,
The Book of Musical Anecdotes (London, 1985: Sphere Books)
- ^ From a letter by daughter Nuria Schoenburg to Norman Lebrecht, quoted in
Lebrecht (1985)
- ^ Ibid
References and further reading
- Beaumont, Antony. 2000. Zemlinsky. Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0801438035.
- Buhle, Pal, and David Wagner. 2002. Radical Hollywood: The Untold Story Behind America's Favorite Movies. New York:
The New Press.
- Lebrecht, Norman. 2001. "Why We're Still Afraid of Schoenberg". The Lebrecht Weekly (July 8): [pp.?]
- Schoenberg, Arnold. 1959. Structural Functions of Harmony. Translated by Leonard Stein. London: Williams and Norgate
Revised edition, New York, London: W. W. Norton and Company 1969. ISBN 0-393-00478-3.
- Rosen, Charles. 1975. Arnold Schoenberg. New York: Viking Press. ISBN 0670133167 (pbk) ISBN 0670019860 (cloth).
Reprinted 1996, with a new preface. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0226726436
- Schonberg, Harold C. 1970. The Lives of the Great Composers. New York: W. W. Norton. ISBN 0393021467 (Revised ed., New
York: W. W. Norton, 1980. ISBN 0393013022 Third ed. New York: W.W. Norton, 1997. ISBN 0393038572)
- Schoenberg, Arnold. 1922. Harmonielehre. Third edition. Vienna: Universal Edition. (Originally published 1911).
Translation by Roy E. Carter, based on the third ed., as Theory of Harmony. Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of
California Press, 1978. ISBN 0-520-04945-4.
- Schoenberg, Arnold. 1967. Fundamentals of Musical Composition. Edited by Gerald Strang, with an introduction by
Leonard Stein. New York: St. Martin's Press. Reprinted 1985, London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 0571092764
- Schoenberg, Arnold. 1975. Style and Idea: Selected Writings of Arnold Schoenberg. Edited by Leonard Stein, with
translations by Leo Black. New York: St. Martins Press; London: Faber & Faber. ISBN 0-520-05294-3. Expanded from the 1950
Philosophical Library (New York) publication edited by Dika Newlin. The volume carries the
note "Several of the essays...were originally written in German (translated by Dika Newlin)" in both editions.
- Stuckenschmidt, Hans Heinz. 1977. Schoenberg: His Life, World and Work. Translated from the German by Humphrey Searle.
New York: Schirmer Books.
- Worldspace Radio. 2007. Maestro "Concert Hall Presentation". 13 July 2007; Featured piece.[citation needed]
Further reading
- Auner, Joseph. 1993. A Schoenberg Reader. New Haven: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-09540-6.
- Brand, Julianne, Christopher Hailey, and Donald Harris (editors). 1987. The Berg-Schoenberg Correspondence: Selected
Letters. New York, London: W. W. Norton and Company. ISBN 0-393-01919-5.
- Byron, Avior. 2006. 'The Test Pressings of Schoenberg Conducting Pierrot lunaire: Sprechstimme Reconsidered', Music Theory
Online, Volume 12, Number 1, February 2006. http://www.societymusictheory.org/mto/issues/mto.06.12.1/mto.06.12.1.byron_frames.html
- Schoenberg, Arnold. 1964. Preliminary Exercises in Counterpoint. Edited with a foreword by Leonard Stein. New York,
St. Martin's Press. Reprinted, Los Angeles: Belmont Music Publishers 2003.
- Schoenberg, Arnold. 1979. Die Grundlagen der musikalischen Komposition. Ins Deutsche übertragen von Rudolf Kolisch;
hrsg. von Rudolf Stephan. Vienna: Universal Edition (German translation of Fundamentals of Musical Composition).
- Shawn, Allen. 2002. Arnold Schoenberg's Journey. New York: Farrar Straus and Giroux. ISBN 0-374-10590-1.
- Weiss, Adolph. 1932. "The Lyceum of Schonberg", Modern Music 9, no. 3 (March-April): 99-107.
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