Track Listing

1. Pieces (3) for piano, Op. 11: No. 1, Massig
2. Pieces (3) for piano, Op. 11: No. 2, Massig
3. Pieces (3) for piano, Op. 11: No. 3, Bewegt
4. Little Pieces (6) for piano, Op. 19: No. 1, Leicht, zart
5. Little Pieces (6) for piano, Op. 19: No 2, Langsam
6. Little Pieces (6) for piano, Op. 19: No. 3, Sehr langsam
7. Little Pieces (6) for piano, Op. 19: No. 4, Rasch, aber leicht
8. Little Pieces (6) for piano, Op. 19: No. 5, Etwas rasch
9. Little Pieces (6) for piano, Op. 19: No. 6, Sehr langsam
10. Pieces (5) for piano, Op. 23: No. 1, Sehr langsam
11. Pieces (5) for piano, Op. 23: No. 2, Sehr rasch
12. Pieces (5) for piano, Op. 23: No. 3, Langsam
13. Pieces (5) for piano, Op. 23: No. 4, Schwungvoll
14. Pieces (5) for piano, Op. 23: No. 5, Gigue
15. Suite for Piano, Op. 25
16. Suite for Piano, Op. 25
17. Suite for Piano, Op. 25
18. Suite for Piano, Op. 25
19. Suite for Piano, Op. 25
20. Suite for Piano, Op. 25
21. Suite for Piano, Op. 25
22. Pieces (2) for piano, Op. 33
23. Pieces (2) for piano, Op. 33
24. Piano Concerto, Op. 42: Andante
25. Piano Concerto, Op. 42: Molto allegro (Bar/Takt/mesure/misura 176)
26. Piano Concerto, Op. 42: Adagio (Bar 264)
27. Piano Concerto, Op. 42: Giocoso (Moderato)(Bar 329)
28. Variations for piano, Op. 27: Sehr m�ssig (at a very moderate speed)
29. Variations for piano, Op. 27: Sehr schell (very quickly)
30. Variations for piano, Op. 27: Ruhig flie�end (calm, flowing)

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #78050 in Music
• Released on: 2003-02-11
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .24 pounds

Customer Reviews

A great Schoenberg collection reissued, with bonuses
Maurizio Pollini's traversal of the solo piano music of Arnold Schoenberg was always a classic of modern music recordings, and this reissue makes it all the more attractive by adding the piano concerto and Pollini's classic recording of Webern's variations to the mix.

The Three Piano Pieces are from the early days of Schoenberg's atonal period, and the first two have fairly strong tonal echoes still. The first alternates passion and ambivalance, while the central slow piece has increasingly tense ruminative melodies over an ostinato figure that increases the tonal feel to the work. In contrast, the radical finale is a torrent of atonal notes whose intensity sweeps away the pensive thoughts from the second piece.

The Six Little Piano Pieces are amongst Schoenberg's finest works. Many are mere wisps of sound, averaging less than a minute each, they evoke fleeting memories, thoughts, then are gone. The finale, an elegy for Schoenberg's mentor Gustav Mahler, is a near-silent ghost of a funeral march.

The Five Piano Pieces are perhaps most famous because the last of them was the first published piece of serial music. The first is slow and tightly knit, the second an explosion of energy. Next comes a slow piece with an almost improvisatory feel and a second energetic one. The last is a rather discursive waltz that applies the new serial technique in a fairly simplistic way.

The Suite is a step backwards in many ways. Gone are the near-improvisatory, concise structures of the previous pieces; instead Schoenberg returned to traditional forms while writing serial melodic lines. I find this the least impressive work on the disc: while well-written I feel it is also rather too dry.

The two brief pieces, opus 33, return more to the atmosphere of the earlier five piece set, though this time in a serial idiom. They are more discursive, more improvisatory, more lyrical, and a lot more fun to listen to. Indeed, they point the way to the lyricism of the piano concerto that was to arrive a decade later.

Schoenberg's piano concerto is a work very popular with pianists (I've heard close on a dozen different pianists play it live in the last few years), even though it has yet to fully break through to mainstream audiences. Written in a four-movement form that plays without a break, this work allows constant echoes of tonal harmony through its serial structure. An ambivalent first movement is followed by a violent scherzo, an anguished slow movement and a more optimistic finale. This is one of the most accessible of Schoenberg's serial pieces, and also one of the best.

Webern's piano variations are in truth a three-movement sonata lasting about six minutes, of which only the finale is in variation form. A moderately-paced opening movement is followed by a witty miniature scherzo with off-center accents, before the final variation set. Crisp, clear and thoroughly atonal, this is one of the great works of the Viennese serial school.

Pollini's performances range from good to outstanding, and only occasionally does he hint at the overly clinical playing that can mar his playing of Romantic-era music. Those versed in this repertoire will probably already have the 20th Century Classics edition of the solo piano Schoenberg, but if not, and you want to explore these remarkable works, I know no better way to do so than with this disc.

dost thou savor dissonance?
Schoenberg's solo piano music is small in quantity, but tremendously important in so many respects that an excellent performance is necessary for any listener of 20th century modernism. I would guess, however, that these works would pose a formidable task for the performer. Consider op.11, the three small pieces for piano. This work at last exploded the Western conventions of tonality. At the time, Schoenberg's atonal mode of expression was new and highly intuitive, so traditional interpretational paradigms would probably not serve the musician well. Thus even as the technical difficulties are overcome, the intellectual challenge remains great. Perhaps this is why so few pianists ever tackle twentieth century piano music (among other reasons). Pollini is considered one of the premiere Schoenberg interpreters, and the evidence is strong in his favor. His performance here is emotionally powerful but also cool and calculated. (The idiosyncratic Glenn Gould's performances of Schoenberg's works are also recommended.)

The vestiges of tonality still linger in Schoenberg's op.11, at least in the first two pieces. The third really drove home the possibilities of atonality, though -- the musical argument is evasive to the inattentive listener, and even those of diligent concentration are hard pressed. Schoenberg's end here was to create a more egalitarian music, a radical chromaticism where each tone is important in itself rather than in its relation to the central key. One cannot help but feel the excitement of the composer in these works, something for which pollini must be commended.

It is good that these solo works are presented in chronological order, as it enables the listener to chart the fascinating development of Schoenberg's approach. I do not wish to discuss these works in detail. I will make only cursory remarks to explain why I think they are interesting. The six piano pieces of op.19 are necessarily short musical dictums that, once capitulated, need not be further developed. They are just little ideas, but they are powerful in their succinctness. In op.23, Schoenberg experiments in finding an organizational principle for atonal music. He applies serialism. Listening to these small pieces is highly valuable for the listener of serial music, because it trains one to recognize the permutations of tone rows; op.23 applies the serialist method to small groups of notes rather than the full chromatic scale. Op.25 is the first fully 12-tone work - the six pieces are all developed from manipulation of a single tone-row. It is inventive and exciting, not to mention difficult to play. Several years later Schoenberg returned to solo piano music with op.33, two short pieces structured more along a chordal idiom than a melodic one.

Alone, Schoenberg's solo piano music is some of the best of its genre of the twentieth century. This disc is worth having for that alone. This edition includes other pieces, tho': Schoenberg's piano concerto, and Webern's outstanding Variations for solo piano. DG has a disc of the solo piano music by itself, but there is no reason to get that when this edition exists. The piano concerto, op.42, is a dramatic 12-tone work, one of my favorites of the 20th century. It is a drastically modern work, full of vivid colors and restless, percussive solo parts, yet Schoenberg sometimes manipulates the tone row for the deployment of quasi-tonal orchestral waves. Despite its rigorous structure and uninviting dissonances by the ream, the work maintains a degree of romanticism -- something the Darmstadt school may have derided, but this listener feels it functions on an effective emotional level. Webern's Variations may have been more to the preference of folks like Boulez and Nono -- it is systematically certain in its serialist methodology (Schoenberg was more relaxed in the application of the 12-tone structures). In addition to being deliciously dissonant and innately raw, it is an exciting display of virtuosity. Pollini shines here as with his Schoenberg interpretations.

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

The Brilliant Best of Schoenberg's Piano Music
This cd contains what is simply the best recordings of all of Schoenberg's solo piano music and of his Piano Concerto. Pollini is brilliant in establishing this music as the modern decendant of Brahms. Everything sounds completely musical and logical (it makes sense musically--sounds natural). It sounds as if Brahms had lived into the 20th Century. The contribution of Abbado in the performance of the Piano Concerto is not to be overlooked, either. Abbado is probably the finest conductor of the music of the "Second Vienese School," and this performance is no exception. Only Glenn Gould comes close to Pollini in this music, and his (Sony) recording is from the 60's with dry sound. Pollini is much warmer and more musical. A great recording!