Kammerkonzert is a piece by Alban Berg using the twelve-tone technique. To create the theme of the first movement Berg used German notation to musically spell out the names of Arnold Schoenberg, Anton Webern, and himself.
ArnolD SCHönBErG - (A-D-E♭-C-B-B♭-E-G)
Anton wEBErn - (A-E-B♭-E)
AlBAn BErG - (A-B♭-A-B♭-E-G)
Atonal Music
Atonal music, or atonality, is music that has no tone or key. Atonal compositions have been around for about 100 years, but the Weimar period, in particular the works of Alan Schoenberg, Alban Berg and Kurt Weill, who used the famous twelve tone technique.
Music without a key means that no note is given particular emphasis, and there is no key or base for the music. In other words, the music is free and can flow in any direction.
The piece above is one of Schoenberg's earliest explorations of atonal music.
Alban Berg
Alban Maria Johannes Berg was an Austrian composer born on February 9th 1885. He was a student under Arnold Schoenberg, who taught him the twelve-tone technique and the concept of atonality.
Many of Berg's pieces combine the theories of atonality and the twelve-tone technique with romantic style music, leading to a blend in styles which is widely regarded as being hugely influential today.
Alongside his mentor and friend Arnold Schoenberg, Alban Berg is remembered as one of the most important and influential composers of the 20th century.
Kurt Weill
Kurt Julian Weill was a German composer born on March 2nd 1900. His later pieces were inspired partly by Arnold Schoenberg, and influenced Alban Berg, among other composers.
Although Schoenberg was a huge influence for Weill, he didn't write atonal music, and focused rather on opera and musical theater.
As a Jewish composer, Weill was forced to flee Nazi Germany in 1933. He became a target for the Nazis, who criticized his later works. He fled to America, and continued to write music, although in a different style to his earlier pieces.
He died at the age of 50 on April 3rd, 1950, and was buried in New York.
Twelve-Tone Technique
The twelve-tone technique, also known as dodecaphony, is a method for composition invented by Arnold Schoenberg.
The purpose of the technique is to ensure that all 12 notes of a chromatic scale are balanced within a piece of music, so that no emphasis falls on any particular one.
The twelve-tone technique is now considered one of the most important composition techniques in history, and is still widely used.
The video above is an explanation of the twelve-tone technique, but may be difficult to follow.
Arnold Schoenberg
Arnold Schoenberg was an Austrian composer born on 13th September 1874. During the Weimar period he invented the twelve-tone technique, a technique used for composing atonal music.
The technique is still widely used in modern music, and has influenced a huge number of composers.
At the dawn of Nazi Germany, many of Schoenberg's works were labelled as degenerate music by the Nazis purely because he was Jewish.
Schoenberg was extremely superstitious, which eventually led to his death on Friday July 13thn 1951.
The Threepenny Opera
The Threepenny Opera wasn't really an opera, rather a play featuring musical elements. It was a collaboration between dramatist Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill.
It tells the story of Macheath, a criminal in Victorian London, who marries a girl named Polly Peachum, angering her father in the process. The play focuses on her father and his attempts to have Macheath hanged.
The Threepenny Opera has been performed over 10,000 times, and translated into 18 different languages.It opened in Berlin on the 31st August 1928.
Mack the Knife
Mack the Knife is a song from the Threepenny Opera, written by Kurt Weill to introduce the play's main character.
Originally, there was no introduction, but actor Harold Paulsen demanded one for his character, or else he would quit, so Kurt Weill quickly wrote this song to introduce Macheath.
It has been covered by many artists, including Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong.
The Theory of Harmony
The Theory of Harmony is a book by Arnold Schoenberg outlining his techniques and offering tips for composers.
It, and the techniques in it, are still widely used today by modern composers.
The Third Reich
The rise of the Nazis changed everything. Music was expected to be free of jazz influence, and much of the atonal music written in the Weimar period was destroyed, either because it didn't follow the rules, or because the composers were Jewish (Schoenberg)
For this reason, our understanding of the music of this period is minimal at best.
