Customer Reviews

Schoenberg: Transfigured Night, Op. 4 / Trio, Op. 45

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This CD presents an opportunity to hear Schoenberg's justly famous and beautiful "Verklärte Nacht" in its original score for string sextet (the relatively more lush arrangement Schoenberg wrote for chamber orchestra - in 1917 and updated in 1943 - typically receives more performances in recordings and concert halls). Here the nuances of the piece along with its gorgeous harmonies, melodies, and counter melodies explode and reveal themselves more so than in the later re-arranged versions. "Verklärte Nacht" stands as one of the greatest achievements of early twentieth century music. As many have pointed out, it stands on the threshold of romanticism and the "new" tonalities of the twentieth century. Schoenberg experimented with dissonance in this piece and disturbed audiences at the time (though audiences today may wonder what was so offensive). In sextet, these dissonances have slightly more punch and are not as hidden behind a curtain of strings. Not only that, the piece still maintains its emotional impact even at this level of instrumentation.

The other piece on this disc journeys to the later half of Schoenberg's life. Schoenberg wrote "Verklärte Nacht" in 1899 near the beginning of his composing career (it carries the very early Opus number 4, which makes it even more remarkable). In contrast, the String Trio was written in 1946. The intervening years development between the Opus 4 and the Opus 45 shout forth rather saliently. The String Trio utilizes Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique. It is a wild piece, and a masterpiece of its genre. It followed a traumatic event in Schoenberg's late life. When he was 72 he suffered a severe asthma attack that caused his heart to stop. He had to be revived with an injection directly into his heart. A couple days of delirium followed. Schoenberg said that this trio played out the entire event musically (and called it his "delirium trio"). Just where the specific events occur in the piece are left to speculation, but nonetheless the story fits the mood of this incredible work.

This disc presents two incredible works of Schoenberg and also showcases his amazing development through the twentieth century by pure contrast of the works alone. And best of all, each piece receives an incredible performance from the always amazing Juilliard String Quartet (with two guests: the inimitable Yo-Yo Ma on Cello and Walter Trampler on viola).

I'll start out talking about the last work first, but please read the whole review. The String Trio Op.45 is one of the great works of the genre. One might see it in several ways. If one is tied to a "traditional" sense of melody and tonality, this piece is probably perplexing. For those who enjoy exploring new possibilities in sound, this is one of the most imaginitive works you could ever listen to - there's a surprise around every corner, and it's amazing that so many sounds come out of 3 instruments.
Verklarte Nacht is from much earlier in Schoenberg's career, during the last flowerings of the Post-Romantic style. This recording gives us the original string sextet version. I think the solo playing allows Schoenberg's beautiful melodies to sing much more than in the more commonly recorded string orchestra arrangement he did himself. While the beauties of the String Trio may take a while for some people to warm up to, Verklarte Nacht is about as "pretty" as you can get, even though you have to work through the turbulent first half before you get to the sweet stuff. And when it's sweet, it's very sweet. Schoenberg didn't take the "transfigured" part lightly. The last half is pure heaven and the coda will send shivers up your spine. It's one of my absolute favorite works.
The performances are wonderful.

These are deluxe readings, in vivid sound, from performers who know how to make Schoenberg sound luscious and rich. On that score, the original sextet version of Verklarte Nacht receives a thoroughly admirable reading, if a bit short on postromantic fervor. Ensemble is excellent, and the presence of two virtuosos in the person of violist Walter Trampler and cellist Yo-Yo Ma makes the sonority as plush as possible. But for many listeners the String Trio from 1946, being late Schoenberg, will inspire caution if not outright distaste.

Contrary to earlier reviews, the String Trio isn't a wild work. It's among the composer's most gentle and reflective. By the end of his life Schoenberg was long past the lurid expressionism of 1908-1913, out of which came neurotic, nearly hysterical works that audiences still run away from, like Erwartung and Pierrot Lunaire. The String Trio may be serial, but Schoenberg's style had made peace with tonality and triads, not as the basis for his harmony but as useful expressive devices. The narrative of his near-death experience helps the listener enter into the work, which is marked by a fierce violin pizzicato at the moment when the needle was plunged into Schoenberg's arrested heart (he referred to it as the needle of death). The delirium he entered gives us musical wisps of waltzes and other memories of his early years in Vienna.

But most important is the fact that the work was written in white-hot inspiration, which was always Schoenberg's way at his most successful. He needed a united conception of sound, timbre, rhythm, and mood to hold together each piece. The fact that the harmonies depended on complexly intellectual theory is beside the point for us in the audience, who were never expected, even by the composer, to follow such intricacies. We were meant to respond to each work on its own terms. In this case, the String Trio's reflective inner quality, the blended sound of strings that form a single instrument, and a recurrent triple rhythm create easy anchors for entering the listening experience. The performance by the Juilliard is rich in sonority and dramatized quite romantically -- not the only way to play the work but an accessible way to be sure. In all, this is a disc where early and late Schoenberg offer equally enjoyable rewards.

I have little interest in the atonal period of music but still find plenty of post-romantic pieces which are engaging. This particular piece is one of those. I was not familiar with Schoenberg and had read about "Transfigured Night" in Ted Libbey's book: Building a Classical CD collection." After reading reviews on several, including Mr. Libbeys' suggested renditions, I settled on this one.

I have not heard any other recording to compare this with but have listened intently several times now to it. The quality of sound is rich and vibrant. The music is modern and beautiful in passages. One should not expect immediate gratification if you primarily listen to classical chamber music. I urge one to listen carefully several times before passing judgement on this piece. It will grow on you. It deserves full praise for it's place in history as revolutionary and the Julliard String Quartet with Walter Trampler and Yo-yo Ma play it beautifully.

To the people who might know the name Schoenberg from radio, relevision or superficial writers a large number know only something about "musical mathmatics". Of course associations between math and music is as old as the Babylonians, it was perhape at its peak in the Baroque. Ignorant music commentators of the period just after Bach's death used the imagined perjorative of associating his music with math to point up the relative merits of such undying composers as Daniel G. Turk.

Of course Schoenberg didn't write his music for people who don't want to take the trouble to listen to it. For those who do this is a wonderful example of his formost piece using tonal proceedures and a late work using his famous and little understood twelve tone technique. Of course a great composer such as Schoenberg only uses a technique to get his points across, the music is recognizably his own in both pieces.

The Julliard Quartet, Mr. Trampler (gee I really miss him) and Mr. Ma play this music wonderfully.

The best version I have heard of one of my all time favorite pieces of music. I listened to this recording practically every day in 1999.

Let me be the first to say that I am not a fan of 12-tone and other "modern" music. The first time I heard Verklaerte Nacht, I remember preparing myself to suffer through the first part of the concert. To my surprise, what emerged was music on a par with Brahms and Mahler at their most lush. Later I worked on this piece with a sextet and found it amazing that something so chromatic and rhythmically complex on paper could come out sounding so gorgeous (when, that is, we were able to execute it half-decently - it is a difficult work)... the Trio, despite its clearly non-Romantic nature, grows on one...

This ensemble pulls it off beautifully, energetically and coherently, making this disc a necessary addition to the classical music library.

This disc is an excellent introduction to both the world and the work of Arnold Schoenberg. There's nothing to be afraid of here, not even the late String Trio, which is given an entirely lyrical, totally convincing performance by the Julliard. I heard this work once years ago and liked it immediately. It's a very interesting and even heartfelt work in Schoenberg's late style which combines the warmth of his early tonal music with the Beethovenian logic and rigor of his "12 tone" music. It compares favorably with the Piano Concerto and some of Schoenberg's late choral settings of biblical psalms, and is entirely listenable and likeable.
Of course, "Transfigured Night" is an early work, in the style of late 19th Century angst through late (Mahler-inspired) Romanticism, and is even loosely based on a poem. The performance here is beyond merely excellent, and partakes of the warm give and take of good friends who can read each other's minds because they've played together many years. It's a perfect chamber music performance, and I greatly prefer this way of playing the piece to the somewhat bloated orchestral version we usually hear. (It's a yawn, to me anyway.) We get propulsive playing here which exposes the underlying structure and logic of the motific writing. It's quite exciting, and maybe (for some)even revelatory. It's a must have item for any music lover of classic music.

This CD interprets the music of Schoenberg in a way that magnifies the opulence and beauty. Schoenberg's use of traditional classical writing in Verklarte Nacht is fantastic. The development of his style and composition is scene in one of the first pieces he composed atonally op.33 (Piano Sonata). The classical tradition is seen in the use of themes. The piece is Sonata form! A classical style of composition. The progressive steps that Schoenberg has blessed the classical tradition will be reviered for many years to come.

(...) I don't understand why people like to attack Schoenberg's early, post-Romantic music. It IS gorgeous and well-written, and can clearly hold its own against the other post-Romantic masterpieces composed (which therefore means that Schoenberg did NOT (...) turn to atonality because he couldn't compose in the post-Romantic style). In terms of performance, you couldn't ask for finer musicians - the Juilliard String Quartet (one of the finest chamber ensembles) blends seamlessly with Walter Trampler and Yo Yo Ma...it's as though they'd been playing together for years! Thus, how can you not argue with a CD that presents excellent music that is performed beautifully? I just don't know. Buy it.