On 3 March 1945, news was relayed to Webern that his only son, Peter, died on 14 February of wounds suffered in a strafing attack on a military train two days earlier. On 15 September 1945, back at his home during the Allied occupation of Austria, Webern was shot and killed by an American Army soldier following the arrest of his son-in-law for black market activities. This incident occurred when, three-quarters of an hour before a curfew was to have gone into effect, he stepped outside the house so as not to disturb his sleeping grandchildren, to enjoy a few draws on a cigar given to him that evening by his son-in-law.
The soldier responsible for his death was U.S. Army cook PFC Raymond Norwood Bell of North Carolina, who was overcome by remorse and died of alcoholism in 1955. - Also from Wikipedia. Fascinating. I didn't know anything about Webern's life.
The first piece reminded me quite a bit of late Talk Talk. I wonder if Mark Hollis listened to this or if it was just a coincidence, given both of them were madly in love with silence
I'm glad to have found one of these outermost condensed works of Webern on the tube. It's quite fascinating to see what ever happened to this man and his music in the fifteen years between this work and that: th-cam.com/video/iwIgmecVTGk/w-d-xo.html I can surely tell Webern would hardly be mentioned in music history if he'd continued in this romantic style of this example. Beautiful and with some interesting harmonic traits, but that's about it. But returning to this piece fifteen years later, I sincerely wonder if the true worth of this kind of music is in the fact it was the first of its kind? My son, when eight months old, sat at the piano and improvised on a cassette, very focused and devoted, the result being something quite like this kind of music: silent, contemplative waves, contrasted by sudden bursts of intensity. There are similar parallels to visual arts, too. I don't like to say it, but mostly I feel like the kid who said "the emperor has no clothes" - but what then does a kid ever know about true art?
That earlier work is also from when Webern was 16 years old! What would we have said about Beethoven had he never progressed from when he was 16 years old, considering that his earliest opus-numbered pieces were composed in his mid-'20s! 😀
yes, this is one of the last opus in which Webern uses the so called "free atonality" - or "pantonality", as Schönberg used to call it. it's furthermore one of the most representative works by Webern in this period.
@@edoardo8365 I'm also trying to compose non-integral serial / dodecaphonic music. I have a question: in the composition the pitch of the notes must be the same as that of the series or can I change the octave? Thanks in advance
@@donnamenzani2727 it depends if it's strict serial writing or freer dodecaphonic writing. I will say that if you analyse a piece like Webern's Symphony op. 21, you will find for the most part fixed pitches in a particular octave, with minor changes every now and then (rules are meant to be broken in any case). but if we're talking about dodecaphonic writing by Berg or by Schönberg in his "neoclassical" period (third quartet, variations for orchestra), but also in his piano concerto, pitches are used very freely in very different octaves. even Boulez broke his strict serial-writing rules.
I often listen to this kind of music (2nd vienesse school and others) but i feel I don't get to feel or understand what is happening. People write about these pieces and say they are a condensed masterpiece. The same happens to me with most of the late 20th century and contemporary music, I feel I am not able to apareciate it, with their atonal tendencies and dissonances. Could someone develop his/her opinion on this matter? I'd really like to understand this. Thank you very much :)
It's refreshing that you have such an open mind to music that feels distant from you. I think that the ability to start to connect with this music is that open mind. I could try to go into how I "understand" this music, but I'm not sure that such an explanation would actually help anyone else to appreciate it. I would just say: keep listening (attentively, not as "background" music) and keep your mind open, and it will begin to click.
First I thought the last piano chord in measure 9 in the first piece was missing in the recording; it's not. It's just very subtle. Another reason one, preferably, shouldn't listen to this with ear-plugs.
Exquisite garbage at its finest. Notice the profound architecture and effective counterpoint. The sublime harmonies are of course of unprecedented beauty. American music colleges - eat your hearts out.
there are simpler and less pompously sarcastic ways of letting people know you didn't like a certain work of art y'know also when i sit down to make these videos i put quite a bit of time and care into them (even if i make them very infrequently), and seeing comments like this on occasion does make me wonder a bit why i even bother putting them out at all in the first place
@@sebastianwang670 To Elijah Sauder: If I offended you in any way, please accept my whole-hearted apologies. In this sad world today we see profound lawlessness, upheaval, and disregard for established principles that governed the cherished way of life. I cannot for the life of me believe people would laud music which reflects the chaos and dissonance so prevalent today when there are more inspiring avenues which foster spiritual satisfaction and vitality. The propagation of this unmusical sadness distracts from treasures of music which have been painstakingly meted by God-loving, spirit-engendered craftsmen of ages past. This music does not exude these cherished qualities but advocates dysphoria instead.
@@steverodak2230 a music of its time. Art is the mirror of the human condition. Sadly Beethoven 9ths is impossible in our times, because it just won't ring true and truthfulness is the only thing art can't get away with.
@@0live0wire0 To Stephen Dedalus: Your point is well taken. And I believe you raise a very good point. A sincere composer putting forth heartful music is willfully a slave to truthfulness which often guarantees its durability. Beethoven's Ode to Joy, for example, in and of itself, is a sincere effort at elatedness and is a testament to mankind's wishful aspiration. Is it applicable today? Or is it more and more a pipedream? As we witness moral decay and degeneration, we see anarchy and lawlessness prevail. Must we therefore listen to Ode to Joy in an insulated idyllic bubble? Yes, I believe, because if we think his Ode is mirroring today's world, we are either hypocrites or delusional. Once again, you are right. However, despite me getting old and crotchety, I refuse to give up on such well-intended music. This is why I find non-secular music more magnetic. Spiritual music transcends this rotten world as it lends an avenue toward hope and gels our faith. "Religious" music, for lack of a better term, can be happy, pensive, mourning, or downright percolate with spiritual love and passion for God. The music of Giovanni Gabrieli comes to mind when performed with boldness and grandeur. Clearly, to me, his music was written with genuine reverence. Such truthfulness as his will never die out. But for now, secular music, should it try to mirror this world of today, would perhaps be somewhat durable should someone like Chopin be resurrected to write another "Revolutionary Etude" as when Warsaw was being invaded. Do you agree?
@@sebastianwang670 I really appreciate your work, although I don't like the peaces. But look at all the good comments, there are way more of them than of the bad ones! On youtube you simply have to be able to live with criticism...
@@arielorthmann4061um well then my teacher was wrong to make us analyze this for a twelve tone project. Either way, what you said is a fallacy. I never said I ONLY dislike twelve tone. And i didnt even say i disliked it. I said its awful because i do believe it is objectively an awful genre of music. And anyway, this piece if not twelve tone is atonal and atonal music I would argue is not even music
@@jannettowers6731 either you misunderstood your teacher or they should be out of a job, since these pieces are very much not twelve-tone and cannot be analyzed as such. though i’m curious to see how you ended up analyzing it
@@sebastianwang670 Ya I agree he should be fired for making us go through twelve tone in the first place XD but he's a good guy, so I don't know if I'd actually want him to be fired. I would rather have a change in curriculum where we study actually good and learn how to become good composers instead of twelve tone analyzers. Maybe this piece is set theory, not twelve tone, but it's still awful
@@sebastianwang670 I didn't say I hate it (although I do) I'm saying it's awful music. I do actually believe there is objectivity in art. There is good art and bad art. It's not all subjective. It's not all a matter of taste. There are aspects of art that may be a matter of taste, but even those who are uneducated in music can tell that heavy metal is not objectively as good as Bach or Mozart. That doesn't mean it's necessarily bad to listen to lesser music, similar to how we can still eat fries even if they aren't as healthy as salads. But salads are still objectively better for consuming than fries. How open-minded do I need to be? That is, how many times do I have to listen to this to finally make a good judgment? There's a benefit to being somewhat open minded but a disadvantage to being COMPLETELY open minded about EVERYTHING. As Chesterton said, "the whole point of being open-minded is to find something to close your mind around" namely, the truth. But I could say that about literally anything. Serial killers find appreciation in killing people. Drug addicts find pleasure in drugs. Alcoholics find pleasure in drinking way too much alcohol. That doesn't mean I have to be open minded to being a serial killer or drug addict or alcoholic. You may think it's unfair to compare art and morality, but I believe that the art we consume, both visually and audibly, can have effects on our moral character. Music has a physical, spiritual, intellectual and emotional effect on humans. Heavy metal, especially satanist rock, damages the spiritual aspect of the human. Shallow pop music does not feed the intellectual part of the human soul. This kind of music definitely is lacking in appealing to the spiritual, emotional and arguably physical parts of the soul in a healthy way. It may be intellectual and people who are more intellectual may appreciate it more than Moonlight Sonata or more emotional music, but that doesn't mean it's objectively good music. This music sounds like it was written by a computer, not a human with a soul. I also don't believe that just because an artist makes something original or different automatically makes it good art. Sorry for the rant.
It is amazing how his earlier music has aged so well
Great piece and performance. Blake's "To see a world in a grain of sand." comes to mind.
You know the pieces are short when Webern titles them 'little'.
terrific performance, thank you very much. I really love these pieces
Wow, the opening of NO.1 is magical
Incredibile (romanzi in un sospiro ) ah il 900 !!! grazie from Italia .
Both sound and silence composes of this highly concentrated piece. A great work ushering in Takemitsu later.
The last one gives me mystical vibes.
Mistic
This sounds fantastic.
Absolute masterpieces.
On 3 March 1945, news was relayed to Webern that his only son, Peter, died on 14 February of wounds suffered in a strafing attack on a military train two days earlier.
On 15 September 1945, back at his home during the Allied occupation of Austria, Webern was shot and killed by an American Army soldier following the arrest of his son-in-law for black market activities. This incident occurred when, three-quarters of an hour before a curfew was to have gone into effect, he stepped outside the house so as not to disturb his sleeping grandchildren, to enjoy a few draws on a cigar given to him that evening by his son-in-law.
The soldier responsible for his death was U.S. Army cook PFC Raymond Norwood Bell of North Carolina, who was overcome by remorse and died of alcoholism in 1955. - Also from Wikipedia.
Fascinating. I didn't know anything about Webern's life.
The first piece reminded me quite a bit of late Talk Talk. I wonder if Mark Hollis listened to this or if it was just a coincidence, given both of them were madly in love with silence
This Is certanly a source of inspiration for Kurtág.
I can’t help but think Breath of the Wild with the sparseness and wild jumps
Superb
Dark and unforseen = nice and neat.
fascinating music!
Yagiz+Donna amato+ ivan in same comment section wott
Lol
My dog started barking uncontrollably when he heard this music. What does that mean?
I'm glad to have found one of these outermost condensed works of Webern on the tube. It's quite fascinating to see what ever happened to this man and his music in the fifteen years between this work and that:
th-cam.com/video/iwIgmecVTGk/w-d-xo.html
I can surely tell Webern would hardly be mentioned in music history if he'd continued in this romantic style of this example. Beautiful and with some interesting harmonic traits, but that's about it.
But returning to this piece fifteen years later, I sincerely wonder if the true worth of this kind of music is in the fact it was the first of its kind? My son, when eight months old, sat at the piano and improvised on a cassette, very focused and devoted, the result being something quite like this kind of music: silent, contemplative waves, contrasted by sudden bursts of intensity. There are similar parallels to visual arts, too. I don't like to say it, but mostly I feel like the kid who said "the emperor has no clothes" - but what then does a kid ever know about true art?
That earlier work is also from when Webern was 16 years old! What would we have said about Beethoven had he never progressed from when he was 16 years old, considering that his earliest opus-numbered pieces were composed in his mid-'20s! 😀
Sublime music.
Lol
Not all of Webern's pieces are short. His Missa Solemnis has fifteen movements and lasts over 55 second in total.
Is this in the periodo of free atonality?
yes, this is one of the last opus in which Webern uses the so called "free atonality" - or "pantonality", as Schönberg used to call it. it's furthermore one of the most representative works by Webern in this period.
@@edoardo8365 I'm also trying to compose non-integral serial / dodecaphonic music. I have a question: in the composition the pitch of the notes must be the same as that of the series or can I change the octave? Thanks in advance
@@donnamenzani2727 it depends if it's strict serial writing or freer dodecaphonic writing. I will say that if you analyse a piece like Webern's Symphony op. 21, you will find for the most part fixed pitches in a particular octave, with minor changes every now and then (rules are meant to be broken in any case). but if we're talking about dodecaphonic writing by Berg or by Schönberg in his "neoclassical" period (third quartet, variations for orchestra), but also in his piano concerto, pitches are used very freely in very different octaves. even Boulez broke his strict serial-writing rules.
Just imagine what Webern would have done with the modern audio technology we have today.
I like to imagine by own rather than a robot thinks for me😊
@@adilivni8688 I don't mean artificial intelligence, I mean using the tools we have for audio engineering today...
@@CoreyandtheFigs i like technology but in music i am old fashion😎 and i am 31 years old.
I often listen to this kind of music (2nd vienesse school and others) but i feel I don't get to feel or understand what is happening. People write about these pieces and say they are a condensed masterpiece. The same happens to me with most of the late 20th century and contemporary music, I feel I am not able to apareciate it, with their atonal tendencies and dissonances. Could someone develop his/her opinion on this matter? I'd really like to understand this. Thank you very much :)
Just pretend to like it like everyone else
Listen to the last minute of Beethoven's Symphony No. 5 and you'll understand this piece. Just tell me if you want a more in depth explanation.
th-cam.com/video/vA77bbM-eG8/w-d-xo.html
Maybe this can help
This stuff is very abstract. Start with something easier. Listen to Schoenberg for a couple weeks and you'll get used to it.
It's refreshing that you have such an open mind to music that feels distant from you. I think that the ability to start to connect with this music is that open mind. I could try to go into how I "understand" this music, but I'm not sure that such an explanation would actually help anyone else to appreciate it. I would just say: keep listening (attentively, not as "background" music) and keep your mind open, and it will begin to click.
Ethereal.
This is like Beethoven but without all of the beautiful music
well you’re more than welcome to go and listen to all the Beethoven you want
@@sebastianwang670No, no, there’s a point. Much of Beethoven is ugly, and there’s a reason it appeals to us as humans.
First I thought the last piano chord in measure 9 in the first piece was missing in the recording; it's not. It's just very subtle. Another reason one, preferably, shouldn't listen to this with ear-plugs.
I prefer his Concerto for the Left Big Toe 😂
Sure influenced Bartok's two sonatas for violin and piano!
Unlikely given the publication date....
More melody
Hola mamá.
This is uwu
I'd even say OwO
This is ו×
Sublime trace in nothing.
Exquisite garbage at its finest. Notice the profound architecture and effective counterpoint. The sublime
harmonies are of course of unprecedented beauty. American music colleges - eat your hearts out.
there are simpler and less pompously sarcastic ways of letting people know you didn't like a certain work of art y'know
also when i sit down to make these videos i put quite a bit of time and care into them (even if i make them very infrequently), and seeing comments like this on occasion does make me wonder a bit why i even bother putting them out at all in the first place
@@sebastianwang670 To Elijah Sauder: If I offended you in any way, please accept my whole-hearted apologies.
In this sad world today we see profound lawlessness, upheaval, and disregard for established principles that governed the cherished way of life. I cannot for the life of me believe people would laud music which reflects the chaos and dissonance so prevalent today when there are more inspiring avenues which foster spiritual satisfaction and vitality. The propagation of this unmusical sadness distracts from treasures of music which have been painstakingly meted by God-loving, spirit-engendered craftsmen of ages past. This music does not exude these cherished qualities but advocates dysphoria instead.
@@steverodak2230 a music of its time. Art is the mirror of the human condition. Sadly Beethoven 9ths is impossible in our times, because it just won't ring true and truthfulness is the only thing art can't get away with.
@@0live0wire0 To Stephen Dedalus: Your point is well taken. And I believe you raise a very good point.
A sincere composer putting forth heartful music is willfully a slave to truthfulness which often guarantees its
durability. Beethoven's Ode to Joy, for example, in and of itself, is a sincere effort at elatedness and is a testament to mankind's wishful aspiration. Is it applicable today? Or is it more and more a pipedream? As we witness moral
decay and degeneration, we see anarchy and lawlessness prevail. Must we therefore listen to Ode to Joy in an insulated idyllic bubble? Yes, I believe, because if we think his Ode is mirroring today's world, we are either
hypocrites or delusional. Once again, you are right.
However, despite me getting old and crotchety, I refuse to give up on such well-intended music. This is why
I find non-secular music more magnetic. Spiritual music transcends this rotten world as it lends an avenue
toward hope and gels our faith. "Religious" music, for lack of a better term, can be happy, pensive, mourning, or downright percolate with spiritual love and passion for God. The music of Giovanni Gabrieli comes to mind when performed with boldness and grandeur. Clearly, to me, his music was written with genuine reverence. Such truthfulness as his will never die out. But for now, secular music, should it try to mirror this world of today, would
perhaps be somewhat durable should someone like Chopin be resurrected to write another "Revolutionary Etude"
as when Warsaw was being invaded. Do you agree?
@@sebastianwang670 I really appreciate your work, although I don't like the peaces. But look at all the good comments, there are way more of them than of the bad ones! On youtube you simply have to be able to live with criticism...
TLDW it sounds like someone with a wood saw and a violin bow and it expects the listener to call it a genius.
Twelve tone is awful stuff
So I guess you must like this work, as it is not a twelve tone work ?
@@arielorthmann4061um well then my teacher was wrong to make us analyze this for a twelve tone project. Either way, what you said is a fallacy. I never said I ONLY dislike twelve tone. And i didnt even say i disliked it. I said its awful because i do believe it is objectively an awful genre of music. And anyway, this piece if not twelve tone is atonal and atonal music I would argue is not even music
@@jannettowers6731 either you misunderstood your teacher or they should be out of a job, since these pieces are very much not twelve-tone and cannot be analyzed as such. though i’m curious to see how you ended up analyzing it
@@sebastianwang670 Ya I agree he should be fired for making us go through twelve tone in the first place XD but he's a good guy, so I don't know if I'd actually want him to be fired. I would rather have a change in curriculum where we study actually good and learn how to become good composers instead of twelve tone analyzers. Maybe this piece is set theory, not twelve tone, but it's still awful
@@sebastianwang670 I didn't say I hate it (although I do) I'm saying it's awful music. I do actually believe there is objectivity in art. There is good art and bad art. It's not all subjective. It's not all a matter of taste. There are aspects of art that may be a matter of taste, but even those who are uneducated in music can tell that heavy metal is not objectively as good as Bach or Mozart. That doesn't mean it's necessarily bad to listen to lesser music, similar to how we can still eat fries even if they aren't as healthy as salads. But salads are still objectively better for consuming than fries.
How open-minded do I need to be? That is, how many times do I have to listen to this to finally make a good judgment? There's a benefit to being somewhat open minded but a disadvantage to being COMPLETELY open minded about EVERYTHING. As Chesterton said, "the whole point of being open-minded is to find something to close your mind around" namely, the truth.
But I could say that about literally anything. Serial killers find appreciation in killing people. Drug addicts find pleasure in drugs. Alcoholics find pleasure in drinking way too much alcohol. That doesn't mean I have to be open minded to being a serial killer or drug addict or alcoholic. You may think it's unfair to compare art and morality, but I believe that the art we consume, both visually and audibly, can have effects on our moral character. Music has a physical, spiritual, intellectual and emotional effect on humans. Heavy metal, especially satanist rock, damages the spiritual aspect of the human. Shallow pop music does not feed the intellectual part of the human soul. This kind of music definitely is lacking in appealing to the spiritual, emotional and arguably physical parts of the soul in a healthy way. It may be intellectual and people who are more intellectual may appreciate it more than Moonlight Sonata or more emotional music, but that doesn't mean it's objectively good music.
This music sounds like it was written by a computer, not a human with a soul.
I also don't believe that just because an artist makes something original or different automatically makes it good art.
Sorry for the rant.