Chamber Symphony No. 2 (Schoenberg)

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Chamber Symphony No. 2 in E-flat minor and G major, Opus 38, by Arnold Schoenberg was begun in 1906 and completed in 1939. The work is scored for strings, 2 flutes, 2 oboes, 2 clarinets, 2 bassoons, and 2 horns, and is divided into two movements, the first marked Adagio and the second Con Fuoco, Lento. The completion of his second chamber symphony signifies Schoenberg’s return to tonal music late in his life. In 1939, Schoenberg added 20 bars to the original first movement, wrote the latter half of the second movement, and revised and re-orchestrated his earlier unfinished composition.^[1] He considered adding a third movement, Adagio, and sketched out 80 bars of it in 1940, but decided that the musical and ‘psychic’ problems in the work had already been presented thoroughly in the first two movements.^[2]

The completion of Schoenberg's second chamber symphony was prompted by the turning point in his music that occurred in the late 1930s. Since 1920, Schoenberg had explored and reinterpreted principles first from the Baroque era, then from the Classical period, and finally from the fluid and formal style of the late 1800s. Schoenberg’s next step brought him back to the compositions of his early expressionist years, during which he had first abandoned tonal music.^[1]

When Schoenberg began his Chamber Symphony No. 2 in 1906, it was on the verge of a major stylistic change in his music. His first chamber symphony, opus 9, adopts concise form, establishes the soloistic orchestral writing found sparsely in his Gurre-Lieder and Pelleas und Melisande, and features some of the small, diverse instrumental ensembles that would become a prominent part of his later style. After completing this work, Schoenberg thought he had reached his mature style, but he soon began to look for new ways of expression.^[1]

Schoenberg started work on his second chamber symphony shortly after the first was completed, but in spite of several efforts he was unable to finish it.^[2] When he returned to this work 33 years later, it was likely because he felt that his earlier style retained unexplored possibilities. Schoenberg’s later period is characterized by a great variety of works, and combines many of his earlier styles.^[1] In a letter to the conductor Fritz Stiedry, Schoenberg wrote about the difficulties of returning to his past:

For a month I have been working on the Second Chamber Symphony. I spend most of the time trying to find out ‘What was the author getting at here? Indeed, my style has greatly deepened meanwhile, and I find it hard to reconcile what I then rightly wrote, trusting my sense of form and not thinking too much, with my current extensive demands in respect of ‘visible’ logic. Today that is one of the major difficulties, for it also affects the material.^[3]

Compared to the 1906 version of the Second Chamber Symphony, the 1939 version demonstrates greater contrast between the string, woodwind, and brass sections of the orchestra, using distinct instrumental groups in a style similar to that of Anton Bruckner. It avoids octave doubling in favor of more distinct instrumental lines and groupings, showing that Schoenberg’s later style placed greater emphasis on contrasting textures. In almost every instance in the 1906 draft, first violins are paired with flute, oboe I, and clarinet I, second violins are paired with second clarinet, and lower strings are paired with octave doublings.^[4]

Stylistically, the second chamber symphony generally progresses harmonically by stepwise motion, juxtaposing his first chamber symphony’s movement forward through non-traditional suspensions and appoggiaturas. Schoenberg combined this tonal style with 4th chords and similar combinations to produce a grave and severe effect.^[1] While the first chamber symphony attempts to expand the limits of tonality, the second does not constantly attempt to destroy tonal references.^[5]

There is debate over the reasons Schoenberg chose to return some tonal influence to his music in pieces such as the Second Chamber Symphony, but his own words are probably the most telling. In his 1948 essay "On revient toujours", Schoenberg writes:

I was not destined to continue in the manner of Transfigured Night or Gurre-Lieder or even Pelleas and Melisande. The Supreme Commander had ordered me on a harder road. But a longing to return to the older style was always vigorous in me, and from time to time I had to yield to that urge.^[6]

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