Product Details
Arnold Schoenberg

Arnold Schoenberg
By Charles Rosen

List Price: $17.00
Price: $14.63 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details

Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com

24 new or used available from $7.50

Average customer review:

Product Description

In this lucid, revealing book, award-winning pianist and scholar Charles Rosen sheds light on the elusive music of Arnold Schoenberg and his challenge to conventional musical forms. Rosen argues that Schoenberg's music, with its atonality and dissonance, possesses a rare balance of form and emotion, making it, according to Rosen, "the most expressive music ever written." Concise and accessible, this book will appeal to fans, non-fans, and scholars of Schoenberg, and to those who have yet to be introduced to the works of one of the greatest composers of the twentieth century.

"Arnold Schoenberg is one of the most brilliant monographs ever to be published on any composer, let alone the most difficult master of the present age. . . . Indispensable to anyone seeking to understand the crucial musical ideas of the first three decades."—Robert Craft, New York Review of Books

"What Mr. Rosen does far better than one could reasonably expect in so concise a book is not only elucidate Schoenberg's composing techniques and artistic philosophy but to place them in history."—Donal Henahan, New York Times Book Review

"For the novice and the knowledgeable, Mr. Rosen's book is very important reading, either as an introduction to the master or as a stimulus to rethinking our opinions of him. Mr. Rosen's accomplishment is enviable."—Joel Sachs, Musical Quarterly

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #455428 in Books
  • Published on: 1996-09-01
  • Original language: English
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 128 pages

Customer Reviews

Best starting and ending point for Schoenberg5
Robert Craft was on the money in his description of this monograph as "one of the most brilliant ever to be published on any composer, let alone the most difficult master of the present age." Stripping away any unnecessary biographical details, Mr. Rosen gives a surprisingly deep and insightful chronicle (for so short a book) of both the music of Schoenberg and that of his contemporaries. Whatever path serialism was to follow after Schoenberg, his own personal reasons for creating it are elucidated here more clearly and with greater historical insight than anywhere else that I am aware of. It has been popular of late to denigrate Serialism, implicating Schoenberg in some of the excesses of his followers. This has always seemed to stem from some fundamental misunderstandings about just what it was Schoenberg was setting out to do when he created his twelve-tone system. This work should be mandatory reading for those revanchist musicians and neo-tonalists who practice a sort of musical revisionism in their assessments of Schoenberg's work--indeed, for anyone who is interested in gaining insight into a composer of unquestionable genius.

Best starting and ending point for Schoenberg5
Robert Craft was on the money in his description of this monograph as "one of the most brilliant ever to be published on any composer, let alone the most difficult master of the present age." Stripping away any unnecessary biographical details, Mr. Rosen gives a surprisingly deep and insightful chronicle (for so short a book) of both the music of Schoenberg and that of his contemporaries. Whatever path serialism was to follow after Schoenberg, his own personal reasons for creating it are elucidated here more clearly and with greater historical insight than anywhere else that I am aware of. It has been popular of late to denigrate Serialism, implicating Schoenberg in some of the excesses of his followers. This has always seemed to stem from some fundamental misunderstandings about just what it was Schoenberg was setting out to do when he created his twelve-tone system. This work should be mandatory reading for those revanchist musicians and neo-tonalists who practice a sort of musical revisionism in their assessments of Schoenberg's work--indeed, for anyone who is interested in gaining insight into a composer of unquestionable genius.

excellent mix of bio and musicology5
seeing that this is such a small book (barely 100 pages of text), i was surprised at the depth of this book. as one reviewer wrote, it does not get into specifics about his life ('journeys' by allen shawn is good for that), but it gets into enough. i was especially pleased with the musical analysis of schoenberg's music that was presented here, which those who understand music can appreciate; such is left out of many musical biographies that i have read, and that is why i appreciate it here. it does lend a tremendous assistance in understanding his music, and his working philosophy. (that said, though, it might mean that this isnt the book for you if you dont want to get into theory; again, shawn's book is an excellent alternative then.)in fact, after reading this, i started to read schoenberg's writings on music theory, which ifound enlightening.