Arnold Schönberg: String Quartet No. 3, Scherzo, Presto, Chamber Symphony

Featuring

Pavel Hůla
Vlastimil Holek
Josef Klusoň
Michal Kaňka
Jaromír Klepáč
Pražák Quartet

Arnold Schoenberg

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Performer Biography

The Pražák Quartet, an international chamber music ensemble, was founded in 1972 by students at the Prague Conservatory and has won first prizes at the Prague Conservatory Chamber Music Competition and the Evian String Quartet Competition.

Composer Biography

Arnold Schönberg, the composer, wrote to Rudolf Kolisch in 1932, cautioning against overestimating analyses that focus on 'how it is done' rather than 'what it is'.

Notable Performances

The original version of Schönberg's Chamber Symphony, Op. 9, was premiered on February 8, 1907, in Vienna by the Rosé Quartet and the Society of Soloists of the Wiener Philharmoniker.

Composition History

Schönberg's Scherzo in F major, composed in 1896, was not published until 1966, despite being warmly received by Viennese critics who hailed him as 'a new talent' and 'a new Mozart'.

Compositional Technique

Schönberg's Chamber Symphony, Op. 9, uses a series of six-note chords at intervals of fourths as its main thematic material, which plays an architectural role throughout the work.

Composition History

Schönberg's String Quartet No. 3, Op. 30, was his last 'European' score, composed in Vienna in early 1927 and commissioned by American arts patron Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge.

Compositional Technique

In his Third Quartet, Schönberg employs contrapuntal processes like inversion, retrograde, augmentation, and diminution, often combined, leading to his 'serial' method of composition, where a theme is never repeated literally.