6. Conclusion.

Though Berg was always the most popular of the three Viennese composers with concert and opera audiences, his posthumous critical standing fluctuated considerably. Until the 1960s, when Perle published his first articles on Lulu, there had been little detailed study of Berg's music, and it was generally accepted that he was the least strict, the least systematic and the most conservative and backward-looking of the composers of the Second Viennese School. Whether his supposed lack of system and of modernist conviction was seen as an asset or a failing depended on the writer's attitude to what was happening in contemporary music. To Boulez and other young composers who spearheaded the period of total serialism in the Europe of the 1950s, and for whom Webern was the most important of the three Viennese composers, Berg's attachment to tradition was a sign of an unacceptable willingness to compromise. ‘Dodecaphony’, wrote Boulez of the Violin Concerto, ‘has more pressing duties than to tame a Bach chorale’.

But such views of Berg were based on mistaken premisses. His ‘free’ music has been revealed as at least as systematic as – and, in some ways, more systematic than – that of his colleagues and contemporaries, involving methods of organizing pitch, metre, rhythm and proportion that seem strikingly relevant to what has happened in music since his death. That such innovative and apparently ‘abstract’ organizational procedures take place within, and indeed give rise to, an intensely expressive music invoking the emotional world of Tristan, Mahler and the late Romantics is one of the many paradoxes that underlie Berg's music. The bringing together of elements that would normally be regarded as mutually exclusive – tonality with atonality, subjective autobiographical elements with objective compositional constraints, quotation and reference to popular style with rigorous and integrated handling of all musical parameters – is a constant feature of Berg's music. It is perhaps the rich resulting ambiguity that makes Berg so important an influence on more recent composers, whether modernist or postmodernist. As the 20th century closed, the ‘backward-looking’ Berg suddenly came as Perle remarked, to look like its most forward-looking composer.

Berg, Alban

WORKS

Early works: c80 songs, 1v, pf, 1901–8; sonata fragments, variations, etc., pf; variations, str; for detailed list see Hilmar (1980), only those pubd listed below

op.

—	Jugendlieder, i, 1901–4, 1v, pf (1985): Herbstgefühl (S. Fleischer), Spielleute (H. Ibsen), Wo der Goldregen steht (F. Lorenz), Lied der Schiffermädels (O.J. Bierbaum), Sehnsucht I (P. Hohenberg), Abschied (E. von Monsterberg-Muenckenau), Grenzen der Menschenheit (J.W. von Goethe), Vielgeliebte schöne Frau (H. Heine), Sehnsucht II (Hohenberg), Sternefall (K. Wilhelm), Sehnsucht III (Hohenberg), Ich liebe dich! (C.D. Grabbe), Ferne Lieder (F. Rückert), Ich will die Fluren meiden (Rückert), Geliebte Schöne (Heine), Schattenleben (M. Greif), Am Abend (E. Geibel), Vorüber! (F. Wisbacher), Schummerlose Nächte (Greif), Es wandelt, was wir schauen (J.F. von Eichendorff), Liebe (R.M. Rilke), Im Morgengrauen (K. Stieler), Grabschrift (L. Jakobwski)
—	Jugendlieder, ii, 1904–8, 1v, pf (1985): Traum (F. Semler), Augenblicke (R. Hamerling), Die Näherin (Rilke), Erster Verlust (Goethe), Süss sind mir die Schollen des Tales (K.E. Knodt), Er klagt das der Frühling so kortz blüht (A. Holz), Tiefe Sehnsucht (D. von Liliencron), Über den Bergen (K. Busse), Am Strande (G. Scherer), Winter (J. Schlaf), Fraue, du Süsse (L. Finckh), Verlassen (Bohemian trad.), Regen (Schlaf), Traurigkeit (P. Altenberg), Hoffnung (Altenberg), Flötenspielerin (Altenberg), Spaziergang (A. Mombert), Eure Weisheit (J.G. Fischer), So regnet es sich langsam ein (C. Flaischlein), Mignon (Goethe), Die Sorglichen (G. Falke), Das stille Königreich (Busse)
—	Sieben frühe Lieder, 1v, pf, 1905–8, rev. and orchd 1928; orch version Vienna, 6 Nov 1928; vs (1928), fs (1969), critical edn (1997): Nacht (C. Hauptmann), Schilflied (N. Lenau), Die Nachtigall (T. Storm), Traumgekrönt (Rilke), Im Zimmer (Schlaf), Liebesode (O.E. Hartleben), Sommertage (Hohenberg)
—	Schliesse mir die Augen beide (T. Storm), 1v, pf, 1st setting, 1907, pubd in Die Musik, xxii (1930), separately (1955)
—	An Leukon (J. Gleim) 1v, pf 1908; pubd in Reich (1937), separately (1985)
—	Frühe Klaviermusik, i (1989)
—	Zwölf Variationen über ein eigenes Thema, C, pf, 1908, Vienna 8 Nov, 1908; pubd in Redlich (1957) and as Frühe Klaviermusik, ii (1985)
—	Symphony and Passacaglia, frag., 1913, facs. (1984)
1	Piano Sonata, 1907–8, Vienna, 24 April 1911 (1910)
2	Vier Lieder, 1v, pf ?1909–10 (1910): Schlafen, schlafen (C. Hebbel), Schlaffend trägt man mich (Mombert), Nun ich der Riesen Stärksten (Mombert), Warm die Lüfte (Mombert)
3	String Quartet, 1910, Vienna, 24 April 1911 (1920)
4	Fünf Orchesterlieder nach Ansichtkartentexten von Peter Altenberg, S, orch, 1912; 2 nos. cond. Schoenberg, Vienna, 31 March 1913; all 5 E. Calveti, cond. Horenstein, Rome 24 Jan 1953; vs (1953), fs (1966), critical edn (1997): Seele, wie bist du schöner, Sahst du nach dem Gewitterregen, Über die Grenzen des All, Nichts ist gekommen, Hier ist Friede
5	Vier Stücke, cl, pf, 1913, Vienna, 17 Oct 1919 (1920)
6	Drei Stücke, orch, 1914–15: Präludium, Reigen, Marsch, nos.1–2 cond. Webern, Berlin, 5 June 1923, all 3 cond. J. Schüler, Oldenburg, 14 April 1930 (1923)
7	Wozzeck (op, 3, Büchner), 1917–22, cond. E. Kleiber, Berlin, Staatsoper, 14 Dec 1925 vs (1923)
—	Drei Bruchstüche aus ‘Wozzeck’, S, orch, cond. Scherchen, Frankfurt, 11 June 1924 (1924)
—	Kammerkonzert, pf, vn, 13 wind, 1923–5, cond. Scherchen, Berlin, 27 March 1927 (1925), critical edn (2000)
—	Adagio, vn, cl, pf (1956) [arr. of Kammerkonzert, movt 2]
—	Schliesse mir die Augen beide (Storm), 1v, pf, 2nd setting, 1925; pubd in Die Musik, xxii (1930), separately (1955)
—	Lyrische Suite, str qt, 1925–6, Kolisch, Vienna, 8 Jan 1927 (1927)
—	Drei Sätze [2–4] aus der Lyrischen Suite, arr. str orch, cond. Horenstein, Berlin, 31 Jan 1929 (1928)
—	Der Wein (C. Baudelaire, trans. S. George), concert aria, S, orch, 1929, R. Herlinger, cond. Scherchen, Königsberg, 4 June 1930; vs (1930), fs (1966), critical edn (1997)
—	Four-part Canon ‘Alban Berg an das Frankfurter Opernhaus’ (Berg), 1930 (1937)
—	Lulu (op, 3, Berg, after Wedekind: Erdgeist, Die Büchse der Pandora), 1929–35, orch of Act 3 completed F. Cerha; cond. R.F. Denzler, Zürich, 2 June 1937 [inc.], cond. P. Boulez, Paris, 24 Feb 1979 [complete]; vs of Acts 1–2 (1936), fs of Acts 1–2 and excerpts from Act 3 contained in suite (1964), complete vs, ed. E. Stein (1979), complete fs (1985)
—	[5] Symphonische Stücke aus der Oper ‘Lulu’ (Lulu-Suite), S, orch, cond. Kleiber, Berlin, 30 Nov 1934 (1935)
—	Violin Concerto, 1935; L. Krasner, cond. Scherchen, Barcelona, 19 April 1936 (1936), new critical edn (1996)
—	Arrs. in vs of F. Schreker: Der ferne Klang (Vienna, 1911); A. Schoenberg: Gurrelieder (Vienna, 1912), Litanei and Entrückung from Str Qt no.2, 1912 (Vienna, 1921); arr. of J. Strauss II: Wein, Weib und Gesang, pf, hmn, str qt, 1921 (Vienna, 1977)
MSS mostly in A-Wn; for locations of other individual MSS see Jarman (1979)
Principal publisher: Universal

Berg, Alban