Sechs Klavierstucke

The piano works of Arnold Schoenberg (1874-1951) trace pivotal moments in his development, from the new atonality of Opus 11 (1909) to the extremely aphoristic Opus 19 (1911) and culminating in the twelve-tone experiments of Opp. 23 and 25. The six very short pieces in Opus 19 celebrate introversion; they function almost like a manifesto that attempts to say something extremely powerful in the fewest possible words. No. 1 is written from start to finish without any perceptible motivic repetition, whereas the second piece fixates motivically on the interval of a major third. No. 3 outlines a striking contrast between the hands, with a forte theme in the right literally smothering quiet, pianissimo octaves in the left. No. 4 starts airy but ends with a violent irruption, while the next piece stays more lyrical throughout. These works were all written in February 1911. The final piece, No. 6, was not composed until June of that year. It appeared just weeks after the death of Gustav Mahler, Schoenberg’s musical father figure, and it is easy to appreciate the spare textures—bordering on complete silence—as a means of saying farewell.

(c) Jason Stell