berg sonata

[fnork]

work in progress! just brought this back after a long break - its a part of a second round of a competition where im hopefully playing this, on friday...

[liszt1022]

Thank you for sharing! It's my favorite Second Viennese piece.

[gvans]

Beautifully done. A winning argument for modern atonal music. Thank you.

[liszt1022]

nononono it is very tonal!

[gvans]

nononono it is very tonal!

In the sense that it has no definite tonal center, I must disagree. True, it has only moderate dissonance and is often consonant, that is, it resolves, and is pleasing to the ear. But dissonance does not equal atonality. Many arguments occur over the semantics of tonality vs. atonality and can be reviewed here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atonality

"The term is sometimes used to describe music that is neither tonal nor serial, especially the pre-twelve-tone music of the Second Viennese School, principally Alban Berg, Arnold Schoenberg, and Anton Webern."   -- Lansky, Paul, George Perle, and Dave Headlam. 2001. "Atonality". The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians, second edition, edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan Publishers.

I would think this Berg sonata, so lovingly and expressively played, fits into that school.

[liszt1022]

yawn @ referencing Wikipedia. I don't feel like arguing but I can't call something atonal that has a V-i in the first couple of measures.

fnork, I'm interested in your take.
Also I brought out my score and am getting back in touch with this, thanks to you.

[fnork]

Oh, I hadn't noticed this discussion! It occurs every now and then, of course. Recently, I had a discussion with a teacher of mine, who is an active juror in competitions and often sends his students to participate here and there. He complained at the complications of knowing what to chose when the repertoire requirements in a competition want a 'romantic piece' - Rachmaninoff or Medtner would surely fit, but for some, that would solely go under the category of 20th century music...I told him that I once used the Berg sonata as my 'romantic piece' in a competition...which I still believe is accurate. Not everyone would agree, though.

The Berg sonata is clearly very chromatic, but that doesn't make it atonal. Late Mahler is also highly chromatic...as is early Schoenberg, which we still clearly define as 'late romantic'. For me, the Berg sonata fits into that category as well. This, and the 7 frühe lieder, is pretty far removed from the Berg we find in the Lyric suite or the Kammerkonzert...

[gvans]

I stand corrected. Thanks.