Search results
May 17, 2021 · Analysis of ‘Pierrot Lunaire’. Pierrot lunaire (“Moonstruck Pierrot “), or Dreimal sieben Gedichte aus Albert Girauds “Pierrot lunaire” (“Three times Seven Poems from Albert Giraud ‘s ‘ Pierrot lunaire ‘”), is a 1912 composition by Arnold Schoenberg for “reciter” (actually, a soprano using Sprechstimme) and small ...
- Introduction
- History
- Structure
- Music
- Analysis
- Nacht
- Notable Recordings
- Legacy as A Standard Ensemble
Dreimal sieben Gedichte aus Albert Girauds “Pierrot lunaire” (“Three times Seven Poems from Albert Giraud’s ‘Pierrot lunaire'”), commonly known simply as Pierrot Lunaire, Op. 21(“Moonstruck Pierrot” or “Pierrot in the Moonlight”), is a melodrama by Arnold Schoenberg. It is a setting of 21 selected poems from Otto Erich Hartleben’s German translatio...
The work originated in a commission by Zehme for a cycle for voice and piano, setting a series of poems by the Belgian writer Albert Giraud. The verses had been first published in 1884, and later translated into German by Otto Erich Hartleben. Schoenberg began on March 12 and completed the work on July 9, 1912, having expanded the forces to an ense...
“Pierrot Lunaire” consists of three groups of seven poems. In the first group, Pierrot sings of love, sex and religion; in the second, of violence, crime, and blasphemy; and in the third of his return home to Bergamo, with his past haunting him. Schoenberg, who was fascinated by numerology, also makes great use of seven-note motifs throughout the w...
Pierrot Lunaireuses a variety of classical forms and techniques, including canon, fugue, rondo, passacaglia and free counterpoint. The poetry is a German version of a rondeau of the old French type with a double refrain. Each poem consists of three stanzas of 4 + 4 + 5 lines, with line 1 a Refrain (A) repeated as line 7 and line 13, and line 2 a se...
Pierrot Lunaireis a work which can be interpreted through the sixth song “Madonna”. In this song the only person who could save Pierrot, Jesus, is presented as dead. After a brief period of sorrow in “Der kranke Mond” Pierrot in Part II of the song cycle becomes more depraved in his exploits and by the end is crucified for his sins in “Die Kreuze.”...
Pitch Structures
Everything in “Nacht” is generated from a ten-note motif, introduced in canon starting in the fourth bar. This piece predominantly uses the pitch collection (014). This collection gets introduced in the very first measure with the piano. If you take into account every note the piano plays in the first three measures you get an octatonic scale (0134679T). This is just four groups of (014) transposed by T3. In measure 4, we see one set of (014) in the bass clarinet line. Whenever we see this pi...
Formal Structure
Following a brief introduction, the movement falls into three strophes of seven, six, and seven bars, with section breaks occurring at measures 11 and 17, articulated by a change of tempo to etwas rascherfor the second strophe, and back again to the initial tempo for the third. These follow the stanzas of the poem, and are followed by a coda. The first strophe is canonic in four voices; the second is also canonic, but in just three voices; the third strophe consists of a rapid succession of a...
Musical Structure to Extramusical Elements
Expressionism is a modernist movement that began in Germany and Austria in the early twentieth century. Schoenberg, Austrian in descent, was associated with the expressionist movement in German poetry and art. Being from Austria at this time, his music was often labeled as degenerate music since Schoenberg is Jewish. Expressionistic music is dominated by dissonance rather than consonance, and can create an “unsettling” feeling among its listeners For many, expressionistic music meant a reject...
Notable recordings of this composition include: Arnold Schoenberg himself made test recordings of the music with a group of Los Angeles musicians from September 24 to 26, 1940. These recordings were eventually released on LP by Columbia Records in 1949, and reissued in 1974 on the Odyssey label. The avant-pop star Björk, known for her interest in a...
The quintet of instruments used in Pierrot Lunaire became the core ensemble for The Fires of London, who formed in 1965 as “The Pierrot Players” to perform Pierrot Lunaire, and continued to concertize with a varied classical and contemporary repertory. This group performed works arranged for these instruments and commissioned new works especially t...
People also ask
When did Arnold Schoenberg record Pierrot Lunaire?
What is Pierrot Lunaire?
Does Pierrot Lunaire use a twelve-tone technique?
What is the difference between Sprechgesang and Pierrot Lunaire?
Oct 6, 2022 · Schoenberg: Pierrot Lunaire - An Analysis - YouTube. Vincent Sheehan. 1.74K subscribers. Subscribed. 57. 1.2K views 1 year ago. Vince Sheehan walks through each song of this groundbreaking...
- 40 min
- 1610
- Vincent Sheehan
Dreimal sieben Gedichte aus Albert Girauds "Pierrot lunaire" ("Three times Seven Poems from Albert Giraud's 'Pierrot lunaire ' "), commonly known simply as Pierrot lunaire, Op. 21 ("Moonstruck Pierrot" or "Pierrot in the Moonlight"), is a melodrama by Arnold Schoenberg.
Despite the acknowledged importance of Schoenberg's Pierrot Lunaire, no thorough analysis of the music exists.^ Descriptions of the piece general-ly focus on one or more of the following aspects: 1) the poetry and its images, 2) the Sprechstimme technique / 3) the instrumentation , or 4) the music itself.
This chapter, in three parts, synthesizes and extends some themes in the recent critical reception of the work. The first part sketches a history of the Pierrot character in comedy and pantomime, including a description of the genesis and overall shape of Schoenberg's Pierrot lunaire.
Oct 17, 2012 · In 1947, after the horrors of the Shoah were exposed to the entire world, Schoenberg used many of his “Pierrot” musical innovations to create what is probably the most powerful piece anyone ...
