SCHOENBERG ATONALITY

Rahul Puar 549831035 Arnold Schoenberg’s Transition into the Free Atonal and Twelve-tone Periods

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The idea of thinking outside the box artistically is not a new phenomenon. Every generation of artist looks to their environment as well as the past in hopes of reshaping the future of their craft.

Radical ideas get passed down

from generation to generation of composer and widen the imagination of what is possible.

In the case of the

twentieth century composer Arnold Schoenberg, thinking outside the box was still too confining, so he did away with the box entirely.

Inheriting the German lineage of

classical composition from composers like Bach, Mozart, and Wagner, Schoenberg’s daring innovations paved the way for a new generation of composers to subsequently expand on this tradition of music.

Beginning his sonic experimentation in

1908, Schoenberg embarked on his atonal voyage which would come to port in 1922 as he ushered in the twelve-tone period.

Schoenberg’s early experimental ‘free atonality’

was introduced in a flash flood of innovative compositional productivity.

The end of his atonal period was not nearly

as productive compositionally. However despite compositional inactivity, Schoenberg pressed forward and solidified a highly structured and mature musical language known as the twelve-tone technique.

Schoenberg’s life and

compositions went through a great shift from his earlier

Rahul Puar Page 3 of 15 instinctually-led atonal period to when he had completed his first twelve-tone works.

I intend to look at and

compare Arnold Schoenberg’s influences and works during his transition into the ‘free atonal’ period and his influences and works during his transition into his twelve-tone period. Schoenberg’s pre-atonal works were in a late Romantic style and influenced by composers like Wagner, Mahler and Brahms, who had been moving away from traditional forms of tonality and experimenting with extended chromaticism.

It

was not until 1908 and the composition of his Second String Quartet that the composer began to play heavily with music void of a tonal center. “Much of the quartet is based upon triadic harmonic language, but it is presented in the context of a very fast harmonic rhythm;…Other intermediary passages are so chromatic, so polyrhythmic, and so removed, tonally, from the tonic, that it is difficult if not impossible to place the portions within a key scheme”. 1 The quartet has a key signature and other elements of tonal music, but the work signals the transition from Schoenberg’s mature tonal works into his atonal period. The work was dedicated to his wife despite the drama that ensued during its completion.

1

Bailey, Walter. “Schoenberg’s Tonal Beginnings.” The Arnold Schoenberg Companion. Ed. Walter B. Bailey. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1998. 76. Print.

Rahul Puar Page 4 of 15 Schoenberg had also begun other artistic endeavors in 1908, using painting as an added means of expressing himself.

The year marked a turning point in Schoenberg’s

life and music when he was introduced to the Expressionist painter, Richard Gerstle. “In that year, Gertle moved into the same building as the Schoenbergs’ apartment. He painted pictures of Schoenberg, Mathilde, and their family…In an unanticipated event that rocked the Schoenberg circle, Mathilde acted on her strong reaction to Gerstle and left her family to live with him that summer. She returned to Schoenberg and their children only after many requests delivered by Schoenberg’s students, primarily Webern. Soon after Mathilde returned to Schoenberg, Gerstle committed suicide”. 2 Despite the emotional unrest caused by his marital problems, Schoenberg had a prodigious year artistically. In fact, “Of his sixty five canvases, two thirds were painted between 1908 and 1910”.

3

Also in 1908, Schoenberg began

work on a musical project that would prove to be his first completely atonal accomplishment and set the stage for several other atonal works to follow.

The difficulties

with Schoenberg’s marital life have been cited by many as having spurred his new artistic growth, however, some scholars theorize that there are other influences.

2

Bailey, Walter. “Biography.” The Arnold Schoenberg Companion. Ed. Walter B. Bailey. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1998. 20. Print. 3

Harrison, Thomas J. The Emancipation of Dissonance, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1996. 52. Print

Rahul Puar Page 5 of 15 “…it is also possible that the musical changes and sudden interest in painting, as reflections of general aesthetic trends that were in the air, would have happened anyway”. 4 The German artistic ideals of Expressionism were aesthetically similar to Schoenberg’s new musical developments.

His involvement with the expressionistic

visual artists would become more pronounced in the upcoming years. Schoenberg completed “Das Buch der Hängenden Gärten, Op. 15” in 1909.

This first truly atonal work was set for

piano and soprano voice. “Schoenberg came to feel that a resolution to a tonic was no longer necessary. In this atmosphere harmony no longer had to serve traditional functions and could be organized instead through developing variation, especially by using collections of notes derived from melodic motives”. 5 The inspiration for Das Buch der Hängenden Gärten, Op. 15 came from the poetry of symbolist writer, Stefan George. This was not the first use of George’s poetry, as Schoenberg had also based several movements of his Second String Quartet on his verses.

The fifteen songs of Das

Buch der Hängenden Gärten, Op. 15 had founded a new style 4

Bailey, Walter. “Biography.” The Arnold Schoenberg Companion. Ed. Walter B. Bailey. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1998. 20. Print. 5

Burkholder, J. Peter. “Schoenberg the Reactionary.” Schoenberg and His World. Ed. Walter Frisch. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1999. 168. Print.

Rahul Puar Page 6 of 15 and period of music to be followed up by Schoenberg by several more free atonal works all within the same year. Marking his commitment to his new compositional direction, Schoenberg was also involved in mentoring his students like Anton Webern and Alan Berg.

Schoenberg would

also finish writing Three Piano Pieces, op. 11, Five Orchestra Pieces, op.16, and Erwartung, op.17. in 1909. Schoenberg churned out these works in rapid succession, finishing his one-act opera Erwartung in less than nine months.6

These extraordinarily dynamic and productive

years for Schoenberg would continue as he came in contact with the Expressionist painter, Wassily Kandinsky.

Three

of Shoenberg’s paintings were exhibited at Kandinsky’s “Blue Rider” exhibit in 1911.7 “The fact is that both Kandinsky and Schoenberg were ‘outsiders’ struggling to find their individual voices in a hostile environment. No wonder they were drawn to one another. No wonder they sought to transcend their environments by similar means, relying on that inner springboard of the human spirit Kandinsky called ‘inner necessity’”. 8

6

Stein, Leonard. “The Atonal Period in Schoenberg’s Music.” The Arnold Schoenberg Companion. Ed. Walter B. Bailey. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1998. 85. Print. 7

McCoy, Marilyn. “A Schoenberg Chronology.” Schoenberg and His World. Ed. Walter Frisch. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1999. 5. Print. 8

Weiss, Peg. “Evolving Perceptions of Kandinsky and Schoenberg: Toward the Ethnic Roots of the ‘Outsider’.” Constructive Dissonance: Arnold Schoenberg and the Transformations of Twentieth- Century Culture. Eds. Juliane Brand and Christopher Hailey. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1997. 39. Print.

Rahul Puar Page 7 of 15 In this same year, Schoenberg completed his book on music theory, Harmonielehre.

Up to 1914, Schoenberg would

continue his compositional streak finishing Gurreilieder and composing Pierre Lunaire and Die Gluckliche Hand. Seeing 1915 as the midway point in the fourteen year atonal period, we can see a distinct shift in Schoenberg’s musical output and compositional take on atonality. The commencement of World War I marked a turning point in Schoenberg’s ‘free atonal’ period. “Arnold Schoenberg, who for years followed this approach with successful and interesting results, was also aware that ‘free atonality’ neither amounted to a systematic method nor provided a general, universal alternative to functional tonality as a means to organize pitch. From 1916 to 1923, Schoenberg did not compose any complete work, devoting himself instead to writing, teaching, and experimenting with and developing a new method of composition. The result was what we now know as the twelve-tone or dodecaphonic method”. 9 In 1915, Schoenberg volunteered for the Austrian army after making his move back to Vienna. He also began work on Die Jakobsleiter, which would prove to be a transitional work away from ‘free atonality’ into Schoenberg’s more structured twelve-tone method. The oratorio opens with a repeated hexachord structure that foreshadows the twelvetone method. 9

Roig, Francoli. Understanding Post-Tonal Music. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008. 159. Print

Rahul Puar Page 8 of 15 “Schoenberg’s concept is significant in that it marks a radical departure from the expressionist outburst of 1909, represented by Three Piano Pieces, op.11, Five Pieces for Orchestra, op.16, and Erwartung, op.17. In fact, the uncompleted concept would have been a far more radical departure than that of the completed and published works: Six Little Piano Pieces, op.19, Herzgewachse, op. 20, and Pierre lunaire, op 21”. 10 This was to be a large scale oratorio on the subject of religion, though it would be left incomplete.

During

Schoenberg’s 1915 army service, he was discharged after he began to experience health problems in the form of asthma. Resuming work on Jakobsleiter, Schoenberg was drafted back into the war despite his medical condition.

After finally

being discharged in 1917, Schoenberg attempted to complete the oratorio but his stride had been broken by the war. Schoenberg was also involved in lecturing during this period.

In the space between military service and

subsequently after World War I ended, Schoenberg lectured at the Schwartzwad School in Vienna.

This financially

difficult period caused him to accept charity from students and colleagues. Despite these harsh times he had several students and was lecturing often.

In 1918 he founded this

Society for Private Musical Performances which was a step

10

Maegaard, Jan. “Schoenberg’s Incomplete Works and Fragments.” Constructive Dissonance: Arnold Schoenberg and the Transformations of Twentieth-Century Culture. Eds. Juliane Brand and Christopher Hailey. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1997. 141. Print.

Rahul Puar Page 9 of 15 towards a wider acceptance of modern musical works. “The new society and new private students took most of Schoenberg’s time, leaving little energy for composition”.11 Continuing to chip away at the text of Jakobsleiter and then at the music, the project was finally left unfinished after several years of sporadic work.

The oratorio was

completed by a student only after Schoenberg’s death. “During the following years, until 1922, he managed to compose only a further one hundred bars, which extended to the end of part 1 and the beginning part of an interlude. It is readily apparent that Schoenberg was unable to continue work on the composition at the same time that the ‘method of composing with twelve tones only related to one another’ was being born in a series of new works.12 Jakosleiter is an example of how the latter part of the ‘free atonal’ period was more difficult compositionally for Schoenberg. “The seamless transition that he had achieved in 1907 and 1908 and the burst of creativity that the new style had provoked totally eluded Schoenberg as he approached the twelve tone method”. 13

11

Bailey, Walter. “Biography.” The Arnold Schoenberg Companion. Ed. Walter B. Bailey. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1998. 27. Print. 12

Maegaard, Jan. “Schoenberg’s Incomplete Works and Fragments.” Constructive Dissonance: Arnold Schoenberg and the Transformations of Twentieth-Century Culture. Eds. Juliane Brand and Christopher Hailey. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1997. 142. Print. 13

Simms, Bryan R. The Atonal Music of Arnold Schoenberg, 1908-1923. New York: Oxford, 2000. 187. Print.

Rahul Puar Page 10 of 15 While on vacation in Traunkirchen in 1920, Schoenberg once again began to stoke his compositional fire.

He

started work on pieces that he completed in 1923-1924: Five Piano Pieces op. 23, the Serenade, op. 24, and the Suite for Piano op. 25.

“Two works that Schoenberg composed in

1923 are partially based on the twelve tone method, and his first Twelve tone piece is the Suite op. 25, of 1924”.14 The revolutionary twelve tone based Suite op.25 was interestingly formatted within the confines of the historical structure of a ‘suite’ and even employed repeated sections. “According to the technique’s code every twelve-tone composition is centered on a so –called ‘tone row’. This row is a series of twelve notes built from the notes of the chromatic scale, the order of which is freely chosen by the composer according to his individual intentions in the specific composition. The course of the whole composition or a section of it, then, is formed by a constant reiteration of the row;…In the first place, the row can appear wither in a horizontal or in a vertical position or in a combination of both. Secondly, the row can be introduced directly or in mirror forms and also in all transpositions.”15 Schoenberg used the pitches of B-A-C-H(B flat)in the first retrograde tetrachord in the prelude of op.25, an homage to Johann Sebastian Bach who wrote many Baroque suites. The music of op.25 embraced the formal elements of twelve-tone 14

Roig, Francoli. Understanding Post-Tonal Music. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008. 160. Print

15

Reti, Jean. Tonality, Atonality, and Pantonality, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1958. 43-44. Print

Rahul Puar Page 11 of 15 music while adhering to older musical forms such as the prelude, minuet, and canon.16

Schoenberg had successfully

made the shift from a more intuitive and free form of atonality to one that had structure and organization. He found ways of uniting a piece of music other than the traditional means of creating a hierarchy of tones in a scale.

Schoenberg would continue to compose and work on

the twelve-tone method using these early pieces as a starting point. The self proclaimed “Emancipator of Dissonance” accomplished what he had set out to do: free dissonance from the need to be resolved.

Schoenberg understood that

music was destined to undergo the revolution of which he was such a central part.

“Principles such as compound

tertial harmony and chromatic alteration harbor an innate tendency to expand, causing them ultimately to self destruct”.17

Acting upon the necessity to free music from

the relationships of traditional harmony, Schoenberg broke into his atonal period with full force.

It was a dissonant

time in Schoenberg’s martial life, but the pre-war Expressionist movement and his involvement with visual art

16

Burkholder, J. Peter and Claude V. Palisca. Norton Anthology of Western Music: Volume 3, Twentieth Century New York and London: W.W. Norton and Co., 2010. Print 17

Dahlhaus, Carl. Nineteenth-Century Music Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1989. 379. Print

Rahul Puar Page 12 of 15 may have all played a part in his musical breakthroughs. The music created by Schoenberg during these early atonal years is that of a free form use of atonality.

This is a

stark contrast to what Schoenberg was attempting to do during the latter part of his ‘free atonal’ period. Searching for a way to unite atonality into a formal method, Schoenberg was not nearly as productive compositionally.

His service in World War I broke his

compositional stride leaving his large work, Jakobsleiter, unfinished.

Despite being incomplete, the oratorio had

within it the beginnings of what would come to be known as the twelve-tone method.

The method was finally realized in

his piano works of 1923-1925, specifically his Suite op.25. Schoenberg prefaced the twelve-tone period with the more experimental ‘free atonal’ period to discover the characteristics of atonal behavior.

The investigational

early pieces such as in Das Buch der Hängenden Gärten are dissimilar aurally and theoretically than the highly methodical Suite op.25.

Both Schoenberg’s life and

compositions went through a major change over these innovative years, each portion rendering a different but necessary musical evolution.

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Bibliography

Bailey, Walter. “Biography.” The Arnold Schoenberg Companion. Ed. Walter B. Bailey. Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1998. 11-40. Print. Bailey, Walter. “Schoenberg’s Tonal Beginnings.” The Arnold Schoenberg Companion. Ed. Walter B. Bailey. Connecticut: Burkholder,

J.

Anthology

Greenwood Press, 1998. 51-82. Print. Peter

of

and

Claude

Western

Music:

V.

Palisca.

Volume

3,

Norton

Twentieth

Century New York and London: W.W. Norton and Co., 2010. Print. Burkholder, J. Peter. “Schoenberg the Reactionary.” Schoenberg and His World. Ed. Walter Frisch. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1999. 162-194. Print. Dahlhaus, Carl. Nineteenth-Century Music Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1989. Print. Harrison, Thomas J. The Emancipation of Dissonance, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1996. Print. Maegaard, Jan. “Schoenberg’s Incomplete Works and Fragments.” Constructive Dissonance: Arnold Schoenberg

Rahul Puar Page 14 of 15 and the Transformations of Twentieth-Century Culture. Eds. Juliane Brand and Christopher Hailey. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1997. 131-145. Print. McCoy, Marilyn. “A Schoenberg Chronology.” Schoenberg and His World. Ed. Walter Frisch. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1999. 1-18. Print. Reti, Jean. Tonality, Atonality, and Pantonality, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1958. Print. Roig, Francoli. Understanding Post-Tonal Music. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2008. Print. Simms, Bryan R. The Atonal Music of Arnold Schoenberg, 1908-1923. New York: Oxford, 2000. Print. Stein, Leonard. “The Atonal Period in Schoenberg’s Music.” The Arnold Schoenberg Companion. Ed. Walter B. Bailey. Connecticut:

Greenwood Press, 1998. 83-100. Print.

Weiss, Peg. “Evolving Perceptions of Kandinsky and Schoenberg: Toward the Ethnic Roots of the ‘Outsider’.” Constructive Dissonance: Arnold Schoenberg and the Transformations of TwentiethCentury Culture. Eds. Juliane Brand and Christopher Hailey. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1997. 35-57. Print.

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