Arnold Schönberg

Arnold Schönberg is a Viennese composer who is considered part of the expressionist movement. He was born in 1874 and lived in Leopoldstadt, the former Jewish ghetto of Vienna. None other than Gustav Mahler accepted him as his protégé, by whom he was strongly influenced early in his career. He managed a successful career until fleeing Central Europe due to the mounting Nazi threat. He emigrated to the United States where he taught at a number of including UC Los Angeles.

Music historians often divide Schönberg's compositions into thee periods: late romaticism, free atonality, and twelve tonality.

I was given the task of listening to Schönberg and offering my unsophisticated opinion on his music. I've not done much (read: anything) in the way of analyzing classical music, but thought I'd give it a try. In order to build a basic understanding of Schönberg's development as a composer, I chose three pieces of his that are hopefully adequate representations of each period of his career.

1. Verklärte Nacht, Op. 4 (1899)
• Feels very "together." Musical ideas work with one another rather than against one another. The music seems "logical," in that when attempting to anticipate what happens next, I feel as though it makes sense to me -- not surprising. Feels almost like incidental music or even operatic in that there isn't a strong melody that emerges until later on in the piece, and even then it doesn't linger for long. It is as though the listener is supposed to superimpose his or her own melody on to it.
2. Fünf Orchesterstücke, Op. 16 (1909)
• There is definitely more tinkering with the chromatic scale throughout the movements of these pieces. By staying away from music based off of the major scale (what western listeners are most accustomed to), you add a sense of strain to the piece that can't be resolved due to the lack of a musical "center." The musical textures in this context are eerie and disconcerting.
3. Variations for Orchestra, Op. 31 (1928)
• Same notes as last piece, but more exaggerated. It really just makes me uncomfortable. It's like modern art: some people are just going to say that you're are too closed-minded to understand it, when other people are just going to think it's bad. End of story.

It's not so much that I can't appreciate it so much as I think that it's musically very limited, which is the opposite of what Schönberg was attempting to do by breaking down the walls of contemporary music theory. I just can't imagine this music being used for anything other than incidental music in a classic horror movie. However, Schönberg himself had very different thoughts. In fact, in reference to his emerging style, he reportedly told a friend, "I have made a discovery which will ensure the supremacy of German music for the next hundred years." Well, it's needless to say that didn't happen.