Schoenberg: Verklarte Nacht / Webern: Selected Piano and Chamber Works

Featuring

Ulf Wallin
Torleif Thedéen
Roland Pöntinen
Arnold Schoenberg
Anton Webern

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Composer's Artistic Vision

Webern's early twelve-tone compositions, like the 'Children's Piece' and 'Piano Piece, Op. posth.', still retained experimental traits and were influenced by traditional forms like the minuet.

Historical Context

Arnold Schoenberg, Alban Berg, and Anton Webern are considered the principal figures of the Second or New Viennese School, setting the course for a new order in 20th-century music.

Compositional Technique

Anton Webern's 'Three Little Pieces for cello and piano, Op. 11' are extremely concise, with the individual pieces being only 9, 13, and 10 bars long.

Composition History

The piano trio transcription of Schoenberg's 'Verklärte Nacht' was arranged by his student, pianist Eduard Steuermann, in 1932 as a birthday present for Viennese patron Alice Moller.

Compositional Technique

Schoenberg's 'Verklärte Nacht' is a programmatic work based on Richard Dehmel's poem of the same name, which depicts a forest scene with two characters and their emotional exchange.

Composition History

Schoenberg's 'Verklärte Nacht' (Transfigured Night) was composed in just three weeks in September 1899 during a holiday with Alexander von Zemlinsky and his sister Mathilde, who later became Schoenberg's first wife.