Overview

"An astonishingly lyrical biography that rescues Schoenberg from notoriety, restoring him to his rightful place in the pantheon of twentieth-century composers. In his time, the Austrian American composer Arnold Schoenberg (1874-1951) was an international icon. His twelve-tone system was considered the future of music itself. Today, however, leading orchestras rarely play his works, and his name is met with apathy, if not antipathy. With this interpretative account, the acclaimed biographer of Toscanini finally restores Schoenberg to his rightful place in the canon, revealing him as one of the twentieth century's most influential composers and teachers. Sachs shows how Schoenberg, a thorny character who composed thorny works, raged against the ""Procrustean bed"" of tradition. Defying his critics--among them the Nazis, who described his music as ""degenerate""--he constantly battled the anti-Semitism that eventually precipitated his flight from Europe to Los Angeles. Yet Schoenberg, synthesizing Wagnerian excess with Brahmsian restraint, created a shock wave that never quite subsided, and, as Sachs powerfully argues, his compositions must be confronted by anyone interested in the past, present, or future of Western music."

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"""A convincing, laymen-friendly reappraisal of a great musical theorist, teacher, and composer."" -- ""Kirkus Reviews"" ""Despite his postwar decades in California, Schoenberg―with his rattles and shimmers, his craggy melodies and pervasive angst―never quite escaped the nightmares of what was then a crabbed and bloody Old World...Sachs's fine study should inspire a fresh understanding of his life and work."" -- ""Wall Street Journal"""

Author Information

Harvey Sachs, author and music historian, has written for the New Yorker, the New York Times, Times Literary Supplement, and many other publications. He is on the faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia. Paul Boehmer attended his first Shakespearean play while in high school; he knew then that he was destined to become the classically trained actor he is today. Graduating with a master's degree, Paul was cast as Hamlet by the very stage actor who inspired his career path. A nod from the Universe he'd chosen aright! Paul has worked on Broadway and extensively in regional theater. Coinciding with another of his passions, sci-fi, Paul has been cast in various roles in many episodes of Star Trek. Paul's love of literature and learning led him by nature to his work as a narrator for audiobooks, his latest endeavour. Paul is married to the love of his life, Offir, and they live in Los Angeles with their two midnight-rambling tomcats, Dread and David.

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