"'Piano Sonata, Op. 1': Before starting his studies with Schoenberg in the autumn of 1904 Berg had been an autodidact whose output consisted almost entirely of songs: a gifted composer but, said Schoenberg in a letter to his publisher Emil Herzka, 'absolutely incapable of writing an instrumental movement or inventing an instrumental theme'.
"Berg continued as a Schoenberg student until 1910 but the single movement Piano Sonata, Op. 1 of 1908, recorded here in the orchestration by Theo Verbey, was, in effect, his graduation piece. In it Berg set out to demonstrate what he had learned from Schoenberg's music and teaching about how to handle an extended post-Wagnerian harmonic language and how to structure a large-scale instrumental movement in such a way that it was both formally clear and thematically integrated. At the heart of Schoenberg's teaching lay the necessity of what Schoenberg would later call 'developing variation': the belief that the logic and coherence of a work depended on all its aspects' being variants of a single, basic idea. It is a principle that stands at the heart of Op. 1 in which, within a clearly defined sonata structure, a wealth of distinctive thematic ideas is generated from a minimum of motivic material.
"'Passacaglia': Although, as one might expect, there exists a number of incomplete student pieces (there are, for example, five unfinished piano sonata movements that pre-date Op. 1) the two symphonic fragments of 1913 are exceptional in that, together, they represent the only work by the mature Berg that we know him to have abandoned. The two fragments consist of forty-one bars of a symphonic movement and the short score of the more substantial Passacaglia included in this set. Berg's manuscript, which runs to 101 bars, consists of a nine-bar Theme and ten Variations (Variation XI peters out after three bars); it contains some instrumental details and some rudimentary dynamic indications which have been amplified in the present realisation by Christian von Borries, in turn slightly modified by Mario Venzago.
"'Three Pieces, Op. 6': The idea of tackling a large-scale symphonic work was probably prompted by Schoenberg's criticism of the aphoristic nature of Berg's two previous works, the 'Altenberg-Lieder', Op. 4 (the performance in March 1913 of two of which had led to a riot and the concert's being abandoned) and the Four Pieces, Op. 5 for clarinet and piano. Schoenberg had urged Berg to write an orchestral suite, and having, for whatever reason, abandoned the symphony, Berg took his advice and turned to the composition of the Three Pieces, Op. 6 for orchestra. It is a work that has much in common with the symphonic fragments, since behind both, as indeed behind 'Wozzeck', stands the musical language of late Mahler - a composer to whom Berg was devoted. The Op. 6 Pieces, written only shortly after Mahler's death and almost immediately after the premier of the Ninth Symphony, is perhaps Berg's most overtly Mahlerian work - an influence which Berg implicitly acknowledges in his adopting, in the last piece, the fateful hammer blows of the finale of Mahler's Sixth Symphony. It is also the work in which the motivic complexity of Berg's music reaches its height. Starting with soft noises on unpitched percussion, the music of the opening 'Präludium' gradually forms itself into a motivic cell consisting of a rising minor third and a semitone, which will, in various forms, dominate the whole work and give rise to a wealth of interrelated melodic figurations. Constantly developing - through extension, inversion, rhythmic transformation - the figurations produce a profusion of material that links the 'Präludium' with the following 'Reigen' (Round Dance) and 'Marsch'. Dedicated to Schoenberg on the occasion of his fortieth birthday, the Op. 6 Pieces take the technique of 'developing variation' to its most extreme point, the 'Marsch' in particular presenting so many variants of its basic material that the more obviously recurring themes act merely as signposts to which the ear clings amid the unrelenting flow of thematic ideas. Completed in the weeks immediately after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand at Sarajevo, this final piece, which George Perle has aptly described as a 'marche macabre', possesses an atmosphere that seems to anticipate the horrors of the war which would soon engulf Europe.
"'Wein, Weib und Gesang!': Four months before completing the 'Marsch' of the Op. 6 Berg had attended the first performance in Vienna of Georg Büchner's 'Wozzeck' at the Residenzbühne and, overwhelmed by the experience, had immediately started to jot down ideas for an opera based on the play. He was forced to put the project to one side, first because of the need to finish work on the Op. 6 Pieces and then because of his being called up for military service, and it was only at the end of the First World War that he was able to begin work on the opera in earnest.
"Even then the work on 'Wozzeck' proceeded slowly, not least because of Berg's time-consuming involvement with the Verein für musikalische Privataufführungen (Society for Private Musical Performances) which Schoenberg had founded in November 1918. The Verein was an association for members only (no critics were allowed to attend and no applause was permitted), which concentrated on the rehearsal and performance of a wide range of contemporary music. Berg, Webern and the pianist Eduard Steuermann were 'performance directors', responsible for supervising the rehearsal of new works. The Verein finally closed, due to financial difficulties, in November 1922 but a financial crisis a year earlier had led it to mount a 'Walzerabend' which consisted of arrangements of waltzes by Johann Strauss II for a salon orchestra of piano, harmonium and string quartet. Schoenberg himself was responsible for arranging 'Rosen aus dem Süden' (Roses from the South), Webern for 'Schatzwalzer' (Treasure Waltz) from 'Der Zigeunerbaron' (The Gypsy Baron) and Berg for 'Wein, Weib und Gesang!' (Wine, Women and Song!). The arrangements were performed on 27 May 1921 by an ensemble that included Schoenberg as one of the first violinists, Webern on cello and Berg on harmonium. The manuscripts were auctioned in aid of the Verein at the end of the evening, when, to his undisguised delight, Schoenberg saw his arrangement fetch three times as much as Berg's.
"'Three Fragments from 'Wozzeck'': Once 'Wozzeck' was completed (the short score was finished in October 1921 and the the full score seven months later) a piano score was published, the cost of which was eventually underwritten by Alma Mahler to whom Berg dedicated the score as a token of gratitude, and copies sent to various opera companies and critics. It was, however, difficult to persuade and opera company to take on a complex atonal work by a composer who was little known outside (or even in) his native Vienna.
"The turning point came in August 1923 when the String Quartet, Op. 3 was performed at the ISCM Festival in Salzburg. In the audience was the conductor Hermann Scherchen who suggested that Berg make a concert suite from the music of the opera. The resulting 'Three Fragments from 'Wozzeck'' were performed under Scherchen in Frankfurt in June 1924, by which time Erich Kleiber had resolved to stage the opera at the Staatsoper in Berlin. The Berlin premiere of 'Wozzeck' on 14 December 1925 established Berg overnight as a composer of international standing.
"The 'Three Fragments' centre on the figure of Marie, the common-law wife of Wozzeck, and mother of his child, whose seduction by the Drum-Major inflames the jealousy of the down-beaten Wozzeck and precipitates the ensuing tragedy. The first fragment, taken from Act I, Scenes 2 and 3 of the opera, is a March, heard as Marie watches the military parade led by the Drum Major pass by, followed by a Lullaby as she sings her child to sleep. The second fragment, structed as a theme, a set of variations and a fugue, is the opening scene of Act III, in which, overcome by guilt at having given in to the blandishments of the Drum Major, Marie seeks comfort in reading her Bible the story of the woman taken in adultery. The third fragment comes from the end of the opera, when, after Wozzeck has murdered Marie and drowned himself, the great orchestral Interlude in D minor reflects on the tragedy and the curtain rises to reveal the son of Wozzeck and Marie, now an orphan, playing with other children. A child runs on to announce the discovery of Marie's body and, after a moment's hesitation, Marie's son follows his comrades to see the corpse.
"'Der Wein': In May 1925, seven months before the Berlin premiere of 'Wozzeck', Berg went to Prague to attend a performance of the 'Three Fragments' conducted by Alexander von Zemlinsky, and stayed with the industrialist Herbert Fuchs Robettin and his wife, Hanna. Berg's next work, the 'Lyric Suite' for string quartet, which charts the course of the secret love affair that developed between Berg and Hanna during this short stay, is the most obvious outcome of the relationship between the two, but the concert aria 'Der Wein', written four years later, is also a reflection of the emotional crisis that the affair precipitated. By then already working on his second opera, 'Lulu', Berg was approached by the Czech soprano Ruzena Herlinger (to whom 'Der Wein' is dedicated) with the suggestion that he write a concert aria for her. Berg accepted the commission, partly for financial reasons but also because it offered the opportunity to explore in advance some aspects of the sound world of 'Lulu', most notable the use of the saxophone and, in a 'Tempo di Tango', jazz elements.
"For the text Berg turned to Stefan George's translations of Baudelaire, which had provided the secret, unsung text of the finale of the 'Lyric Suite', and chose three of the five poems of 'Le Vin'. In 'Der Wein' the three poems are arranged to form an ABA structure in which the B section is constructed as a palindrome, with the music turning at its central point and running backwards into the final section - a feature which Berg saw as a symbole of his own situation, the retrograde portion of 'Der Wein der Liebendern' (The Wine of Lovers) leading inexorably to the finale 'wine of the solitary one' - Baudelaire's 'Le Vin du solitaire': 'What follows [The Wine of Lovers]', wrote Berg to Hanna, 'can only by the song of the wind of the solitary one - for that I am and that I remain'.
"'Symphonic Pieces from the Opera, 'Lulu'': After the premiere of 'Wozzeck' Berg had been able to rely on performances of his music to provide a steady income, but by the early 1930s political pressures had become such that, even before the Nazis came to power in Germany in January 1933, many opera houses had withdrawn from commitments to stage the opera and Berg began to experience serious financial difficulties. By mid-1934, by which time he had completed the short score of 'Lulu', it had become clear that no performances of his new opera would be possible in either Germany or Austria. Berg, therefore, suggested to his publishers that he devise an orchestral suite from the opera - a 'propaganda suite' which, since the music was no longer linked to the sensational libretto, might be performed in Germany and attract the attention of non-Austro-German, or even American, opera companies. He consequently began to work on orchestrating the opera, starting with those sections that he wanted to include in the suite.
"Based on two plays by Frank Wedekind, the opera tells, in deliberately shcoking and often absurd terms, the story of the rise and fall of Lulu, a figure who embodies the primal, sensual spirit of womanhood. During the first half of the work she ascends the social ladder, eventually becoming the wife of the wealthy newspaper magnate Dr. Schön, and then, having shot him, descends into the criminal underworld where she ends as a prostitute and is murdered by Jack the Ripper.
"The 'Symphonic Pieces' are taken from Acts II and III of the opera. The first ('Rondo'; 'Hymne'), from Act II, is the music of a love scene between Lulu and Dr. Schön's son, Alwa. In the opera this music is spread over two scenes and is constantly interrupted by other events; in the 'Symphonic Pieces' Berg simply excises the interruptions and turns Alwa's music from the different scenes into a continuous whole. The second piece ('Ostinato') forms the orchestral interlude between the scenes of Act II. In the opera this interlude accompanies a silent film which shows the arrest of Lulu for the murder of Dr. Schön, her trial and imprisonment, and her eventual escape from prison. As the central point of the central act, the 'Ostinato' marks the turning point of the whole work - a significance symbolised by its palindromic structure. The 'Lied der Lulu', which forms the third piece, is Lulu's great aria of self-justification from Act II, Scene 1, the number in which the text (in Berg's own words) stands as 'an explanation of her actions... an explanation of Lulu's nature which stands outside all human conception of morality'. The fourt of the pieces is a set of orchestral variations on a cabaret tune by Wedekind, which acts as a transition between the big society scene of Act III, Scene 1 and the London garret of the final scene. Beginning in a clear C major, with deliberately gaudy orchestration, the variations gradually move through polytonality and free atonality to a twelve-note variation, after which the theme itself is heard briefly played on a barrel organ in the street outside Lulu's London attic. The fifth piece ('Adagio') is the music that ends the opera, as Lulu returns with her final client. It culminates in a strident twelve-note chord as Jack murders her, then stabs the Countess Geschwitz who has rushed to Lulu's aid, and ends with the 'Liebestod' of the Countess as she dies alone on stage.
"'Concerto for Violin and Orchestra': Having completed the orchestration of the 'Symphonic Pieces' Berg went back to the opening Prologue of 'Lulu' and began to score the whole opera chronologically. His work on it was, however, again interrupted when, in February 1935, the American violinist Louis Krasner approached him with a commission for a violin concerto. Berg was reluctant to stop work on the opera but his financial position made refusal almost impossible. Two months later, on 22 April, there occurred the tragedy that was to determine the programme and the final shape of the concerto, when Manon Gropius, the teenage daughter of Alma Mahler and Walter Gropius, died of poliomyelitis. Deeply shaken by the even, Berg wrote to Alma Mahler to announce his intention of dedicating the concerto 'To the memory of an Angel' in commemoration of Manon. The work turned into a tone poem in which the two movements of Part I ('Andante'; 'Allegretto') became a portrait of Manon while the opening 'Allegro' of Part II depicted her illness and death. The final 'Adagio' of Part II, a set of variations on the funeral chorale 'Es ist genug' from Bach's cantata 'O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort', offers some consolation.
"Berg never heard the concerto performed. In August 1935, a few weeks after completing the work, he received an insect sting which gradually led to septicaemia. He attened the Vienna premiere of the 'Symphonic Pieces' on 11 December but was rushed to hospital on 16 December and died one week later." (Douglas Jarman, 2009. From the liner notes.)
Performers: Göteborgs Symfoniker, Mario Venzago, Isabelle van Keulen, Geraldine McGreevy, Robert Murray
1.1. Piano Sonata, Op. 1
1.2. Three Pieces, Op. 6: I. Präludium
1.3. Three Pieces, Op. 6: II. Reigen
1.4. Three Pieces, Op. 6: III. Marsch
1.5. Der Wein
1.6. Passacaglia
1.7. Violin Concerto: I. Andante – Allegretto
1.8. Violin Concerto: II. Allegro – Adagio
2.1. Three Fragments From 'Wozzeck': I. Act I, Scenes 2 And 3
2.2. Three Fragments From 'Wozzeck': II. Act III, Scene I
2.3. Three Fragments From 'Wozzeck': III. Act III, Scenes 4 And 5
2.4. Symphonic Pieces From 'Lulu': I. Rondo
2.5. Symphonic Pieces From 'Lulu': II. Ostinato
2.6. Symphonic Pieces From 'Lulu': III. Lied Der Lulu
2.7. Symphonic Pieces From 'Lulu': IV. Variationen
2.8. Symphonic Pieces From 'Lulu': V. Adagio
2.9. Der Wein
2.10. Wein, Weib Und Gesang!
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