Suite for Piano, op. 25
Summer holiday in Traunkirchen
July 1921
Arnold Schönberg Center, Wien
Schönberg probably meant the first version of the Prelude and the Intermezzo of the Suite, op. 25 from summer 1921 to say that he had “found something that will ensure the supremacy of German music for the next hundred years” (as his pupil Josef Rufer recorded; several other sources have also preserved his dictum) – and he was right, despite the irony that remark may contain – the “method of composing with twelve tones related only to one another” was to leave its mark on the music of the 20th century in the most diverse ways. (Eike Feß)
