review of
The Music of Arnold Schoenberg Volume Two
by tENTATIVELY, a cONVENIENCE - October 26, 2011


I wdn't ordinarily write a review of a bk in a record box-set but the 3 bks that came w/ 3 of the 6 Arnold Schoenberg boxsets that I have are so extraordinarily scholarly that it seems important to historicize them even further than they may've already been. SO, in this day of streaming & the vanishing of having actual objects to be collected rather than hardware for streaming & downloading, things like boxsets (boxes containing more than 1 vinyl LP that're usually edited w/ some thematic scholarly thoroughness in mind) may be little more than fond memories for older people. Of course, there're CD boxsets & they come w/ scholarly bklts too but, obviously, they're physically much smaller &, therefore, harder to read. Some or all of this material has been reissued on CD - I don't know whether the CD's notes are as thorough as these or if they had to be cut for reasons of space.

ANYWAY, the cover of this bk has a negative copy of a canon that Schoenberg sent to Craft, the conductor, & the bk is chockfull of such goodies. Robert Craft has always been important to me as the person who conducted all of Varèse's work AND Webern's AND most of Schoenberg's - a powerful trio of early 20th century composers.

Just listing the contents of this is probably enuf to give Schoenberg enthusiasts an idea of why I consider this worth reviewing:

A Feb 17, 1950 note of Schoenberg's made as a "Foreword to a Broadcast Recording of Pelleas and Melisande".

followed by notes re Schoenberg re the same piece that give musical examples in notation form.

followed by notes from composer Eric Salzman re Schoenberg's "Prelude to the Genesis Suite"

followed by "Arnold Schoenberg on his Variations for Orchestra, Op. 31" - "A Dialogue with his pupil, Erwin Stein, originally published in "Pult und Taktstock""

followed by British composer Roberto Gerhard's notes re "Variations for Orchestra"

followed by Schoenberg's notes re his "Verklaerte Nacht", again w/ musical notation examples

followed by Robert Craft's "Marginalia".

A great composer commenting on his own work, 2 other prominent composer commenting on it as well, the conductor adding his considerably-more-than-2¢'s-worth. &, of course, if one has the recordings, one gets to listen to this great music as well. ( )