Schoenberg: Chamber Symphony No. 2
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CD Details
Composer: SchoenbergConductor: Craft
Orchestra: Philharmonia Orchestra
Performer: Beesley
Performer: Simon Joly Chorale
Performer: New York Woodwind Quintet
Edition: Music CD
CD Release Date: 2008-04-29
Music Label: Naxos
Soundtracks:
- Chamber Symphony No. 2 in E flat minor, Op. 38: Adagio
- Chamber Symphony No. 2 in E flat minor, Op. 38: Con fuoco
- Die gl?ckliche Hand, 1-act drama, Op. 18: 1. Bild
- Die gl?ckliche Hand, 1-act drama, Op. 18: 2. Bild
- Die gl?ckliche Hand, 1-act drama, Op. 18: 3. Bild
- Die gl?ckliche Hand, 1-act drama, Op. 18: 4. Bild
- Quintet for winds, Op. 26: 1. Schwungvoll
- Quintet for winds, Op. 26: 2. Anmutig und heiter; Scherzando
- Quintet for winds, Op. 26: 3. Etwas langsam. Poco adagio
- Quintet for winds, Op. 26: 4. Rondo
Music reviews of Schoenberg: Chamber Symphony No. 2
Music Review: Exploring Schoenberg with Robert Craft
Rating: 5 Stars
The conductor and scholar Robert Craft is an acknowledged expert on Schoenberg and Stravinsky. He has recorded a series of works of Schoenberg on the Koch label which, together with new recordings, have been reissued on Naxos. I have been taking the opportunity to hear Schoenberg's works in detail through a five CD box set of Craft's, The Works of Arnold Schoenberg, Vol. 1 which includes this individually-issued CD. Each release tends to present a spectrum of Schoenberg's music, from his late romantic early compositions to the twelve tone works of his maturity. The CDs also range from relatively familiar Schoenberg to the obscure. Craft has written detailed program notes for each volume.
The three works on this CD show the variety of his musical styles. Although completed in 1939, well after Schoenberg had developed his twelve-tone style, the Chamber Symphony no. 2, opus 38 is an early work which the composer began in 1906 but then put aside for more than 30 years. This two-movement work of less than 20 minutes duration is accessible but rarely heard. Although mostly composed earlier, the development of the composer's style between 1906 and 1939 seems to me to show. The opening movement, adagio, is taut. It develops and varies a single lengthy theme through its seven-minute course. The finale marked con fuoco begins with a more relaxed, punctuated theme. As the movement progresses, the theme is subjected to a great deal of counterpoint. Tempos slow near the end of the piece as the work comes to a broad conclusion. Although this work is generally considered to show a late romantic style, its harmony, tight construction, and fugal character make it more of a modern piece.
The second piece on this CD, "Die gluckliche Hand" (The Lucky Hand or The Hand of Fate) opus 18 is a one-act opera Schoenberg completed in 1913. There is an earlier and still available recording of this work conducted by Pierre Boulez. Schoenberg wrote the libretto to the score as well which, unfortunately, is not included with this CD. The work is in four highly impressionistic and emotive scenes. When performed on the stage, the music and acting are to be done to the accompaniment of light of changing colors -- perhaps an early psychedelic effect. The opera includes one singing character, the "Man", two characters who perform in pantomine, two small choruses, one male and one female, and an offstage orchestra, The story is very strange as Schoenberg sardonically observes and comments upon himself, his artistic ambitions, and his cuckolding. The first and fourth scenes include singing by the chorus who mock and comment upon the Man's artistic and personal endeavors. The Man appears only in the second and third scenes. He sings short declamatory phrases interrupted by many shrieks and outbursts from the orchestra. The story centers upon the Man's creation of a jewel for his faithless beloved. The jewel is destroyed, the beloved is lost, and the Man's artistic integrity threatened. This is a highly subjective modernist piece with, I think, more of later romanticism in it than the Chamber Symphony No 2.
The CD concludes with a work entirely in the twelve-tone style, Schoenberg's Wind Quintet opus 26. This four-movement work dates from 1924 and is scored for horn, bassoon, oboe, flute, and clarinet. It is performed here by the New York Woodwind Quintet in a recording dating from 2004. Most wind quintets tend to be more accessible in character than, for example, the more austure form of the string quartet. But not Schoenberg's. This quintet is difficult in its uncompromising 12 tone style and in the virtuosity required from its performers. It is a work of high seriousness. According to Craft's notes on the piece, the work took one hour to perform at its premier. The work is 38 minutes in duration on this CD by the highly gifted wind ensemble.
I found it useful to look at the conservative elements of the work in listening to its formidable 12 tone idiom. The four movements follow the format of a traditional classical chamber piece with an opening sonata -like movement, a second movement scherzo, and slow third movement, and a concluding rondo. The piece also seems relatively traditional in its rhythmic structure. The instrumental parts are difficult, as noted, but the voices and themes lead from one instrument to the other. The 12 tone method gives the work a tight construction of related movements. The expressive character of the four-movement chamber work does, with repeated listenings, seem to me to come through. With his new compositional style, Schoenberg, I think, was trying to take a traditional form and use it in a fresh way, shorn of the accretions, conventionalities, and expectations that had developed over many
years. He wanted to concentrate on his musical expression to avoid platitudes and ease, and he demanded his listeners do the same in hearing this music. This wind quintet remains difficult. But for me it rewarded the effort it took to hear it in repeated listenings.
It is good to have the opportunity to explore the many-faceted works of a seminal but still controversial 20th Century composer in these budget-priced recordings by Robert Craft. I am looking forward to hearing and learning more about Schoenberg in the remaining CDs in this Naxos collection.
Robin Friedman
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