Date of composition: 1909
Premiere: 3 September 1912 at Queen's Hall in London, conductor: Sir Henry Wood
Duration: 20 minutes
Performances by the Berliner Philharmoniker:
first performed on 11 December 1922 in the 1922 version, conductor: Wilhelm Furtwängler
Arnold Schoenberg, born in Vienna in 1874, traversed multiple stylistic phases in his career as a composer. He began as a late Romantic, inspired mainly by Richard Strauss’ tone poems, before emancipating himself from his idol, pushing the boundaries of tonal harmony, and eventually abandoning traditional tonal systems altogether. He ultimately developed his own method – the twelve-tone technique, in which all twelve chromatic notes are treated as equals. In 1909, Schoenberg composed his Five Pieces for Orchestra in a freely atonal style.
Could emotion exist without the familiar vocabulary of tonality? This was the central question Schoenberg explored in these pieces. He was not interested in writing abstract music, on the contrary, his music aimed for profound expression – albeit beyond conventional rules. The opening movement is tense and aggressive, ending in open ambiguity. The second is delicate and intricate, almost impressionistic. The third is nebulous, its only motion the gradual shifts of tone colours. The fourth, scherzo-like, is brisk and confrontational in its sonority. The finale progresses energetically, yet its purpose remains enigmatic. Are these the voices of the subconscious?
Upon receiving the Five Pieces for Orchestra, Schoenberg’s publisher urged him to add programmatic titles for them. Reluctantly, the composer proposed: 1. Premonitions, 2. The Past, 3. Colours, 4. Peripeteia, 5. The Obligatory Recitative. Unimpressed with the commercial potential of these suggestions, the publisher released the first edition without the titles.
The premiere took place on 3 September 1912 in London at the Proms, conducted by festival founder Sir Henry Wood with the Queen’s Hall Orchestra. The newspaper The Nation subsequently reported: “It is not often that an English audience hisses the music it does not like, but a good third of the people at Queen's Hall last Tuesday permitted themselves that luxury …. Another third of the audience was only not hissing because it was laughing, and the remaining third seemed too puzzled either to laugh or to hiss...”
Yet, one man sat enthralled amidst the angry crowd: Gustav Holst. Inspired, Holst resolved to create equally overwhelming music. His initial working title for the project he soon began was Seven Pieces for Orchestra, but he later changed his mind – and renamed the score The Planets.