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Willi Reich's Webern

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 February 2010

Kathryn Bailey
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Extract

THE WORLD'S VIEW of the later works of Webern has been influenced to a significant degree by the personal recollections of Willi Reich. In studying Webern materials one frequently come across letters to Reich and notes that represent his record of conversations or lessons with Webern. The latter are sometimes very curious, and, because of their declared provenance (it is difficult to justify questioning or disregarding what purport to be Webern's own utterances), they bear a considerable responsibility for the confusion that persists concerning certain of the late works. One of the most widely known of these, the op.27 Variations for piano, has been subjected to perhaps more frequent and less likely explanations than any other.

Type
Research Article
Information
Tempo , Issue 165 , June 1988 , pp. 18 - 22
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1988

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References

1 Hans, and Moldenhaucr, Rosalccn, Anton von Webern: A Chronicle of His Life and Work (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1979)Google Scholar. The sketches for op.27 are described on pp.481–486.

2 The sketches for this work are in Sketchbook 111 in the Paul Sacher Stiftung in Basel.

3 Webern, Anton, Letters to Hildegard Joneimd Josef Hwnplik, ed. I'olnauer, Josef, trans. Cornelius Cardew (Bryn Mawr: Theodore Presser, 1967), letter no. 68 p. 32Google Scholar.

4 ‘The Evolution of Variation Form in the Music of Webern’ in Current Musicology 16, p.56Google Scholar.

5 ‘Die Spiegelsymmetrie in Anton Weberns Variationen für Klavier’ in Archiv für Musikwissmschaft 30 (1973), p. 38Google Scholar.

6 Webern's, Variations for Piano, Op. 27Google Scholar: Musical Structure and the Performance Score' in Integral (autumn, 1987), p. 69.

7 Schoenberg and His School, trans. Ncwlin, Dika (New York: Philosophical Library, 1948), pp. 226–238Google Scholar.

8 Weberns Beitrag zur Stilwende der Neuen Musik (München/Salzburg: Musikverlag Emil Katzbichlcr, 1976), p. 303Google Scholar. This work was a dissertation, written in 1966; it was published and made widely available only ten years later.

9 ‘Webern's Path to the Serial Variation’ in Perspectives of New Music 7/2, pp. 83–84.

10 Webems Beitrag, p. 294. In a footnote, Döhl says ‘Dr. W. Reich stellte mir freundlicherwcise seine damaligen Notizen zur Verfügung’.

11 The preliminary work on this row is on pp. 43–44 of the Sachcr Stiftung's Sketchbook III. The row as it finally evolved appears, with the four untransposed forms written out, on p. 44.

12 Rognoni, Luigi, La scuola musicale di Vienna (Turin: 1966), pp. 335ffGoogle Scholar; and Wildgans, Friedrich, Anton Webem—eine Studie (Tübingen: Rainer Wunderlich Vcrlag, 1967), pp. 133–150Google Scholar.

13 Husch, Regina, ‘Über die Musik von Anton Webern’ in Österreichische Musikzeitschrift 36 (1981), p. 480Google Scholar.

14 Webern's, Variationsforpiano', pp. 67–68Google Scholar.

15 This predilection has already shown itself in the several movements of op.21 and op.24, which are also concerned with symmetry. The Symphony is specifically concerned with the synthesis of horizontal and vertical (realized through homophonic structures and canon), the Concerto with the synthesis of homophonic forms.