Pelleas und Melisande (Schoenberg)

Pelleas und Melisande, Op. 5, is a symphonic poem written by Arnold Schoenberg and completed on February 1903. It was premiered on 25 January 1905 at the Musikverein in Vienna under the composer's direction in a concert that also included the first performance of Alexander von Zemlinsky's Die Seejungfrau.[1] The work is based on Maurice Maeterlinck's play Pelléas and Mélisande, a subject suggested by Richard Strauss. When he began composing the work in 1902, Schoenberg was unaware that Claude Debussy's opera, also based on Maeterlinck's play, was about to premiere in Paris.

Contents

Instrumentation and Analysis

The symphonic poem is scored for 1 piccolo, 3 flutes (3rd doubling 2nd piccolo), 3 oboes (3rd doubling 2nd English horn), 1 English horn, 1 E flat clarinet, 3 clarinets in B flat and A (3rd doubling 2nd bass clarinet), 1 bass clarinet, 3 bassoons, 1 contrabassoon, 8 horns in F, 4 trumpets in E and F, 1 alto trombone, 4 tenor trombones, 1 tuba, timpani (2 players), triangle, cymbals, tam-tam, large tenor drum, bass drum, glockenspiel, 2 harps, and strings.

The work is in the key of D minor, and is an example of Schoenberg's early tonal works. It is one continuous movement which comprises of many inter-related sections. The major sections are delineated by the following tempo markings:

This piece made the first notated use of a trombone glissando[2] in the section where Golaud leads Pelleas to the underground tombs.

Theme groups, similar to the leitmotif, which are associated with individual scenes or people, form the building-blocks of a symphonic development, which has its beginning in the forest scene introducing the first movement, where Golo meets Melisande and they marry, and continues on through the inner segments of the Scherzo, which portrays the scene at the fountain where Melisande loses her wedding ring and encounters with Golo's half-brother Pelleas, and Adagio, which portrays the farewell and love scene of Pelleas and Melisande, where Golo kills Pelleas, and leads to the recapitulation of the thematic material in the Finale, which portrays the death of Melisande. In a letter to his brother-in-law, Alexander Zemlinsky, who wanted to make cuts in "Pelleas" for a Prague performance he was to conduct in 1918, Schoenberg summarized the fundamental anchoring points of this work: "the opening motif (12/8) is linked to Melisande", which is followed by the "fate motif", and the Scherzo contains "the game with the ring", the Adagio the "scene with Melisande's Hair", and the "love scene; […] the dying Melisande" and "entrance of the ladies in waiting, Melisande's death" in the finale.

Under the impression of the Anthony Tudor's ballet version of his Verklärte Nacht as Pillar of Fire, which premiered in 1942 in New York, Schoenberg, in American exile, decided for commercial reasons to modify and arrange the work's score for ballet as well by expanding the one-movement symphonic poem into a multi-movement suite. Schoenberg first spoke of this in early 1947, in a letter to his son-in-law Felix Greissle. However, the project collapsed due to the Associated Music Publishers, who managed to successfully prevent authorization.[3]

References

  1. ^ Malcolm MacDonald: 'Schoenberg' (Oxford University Press, 2008)
  2. ^ Craft, Robert. The Music of Arnold Schoenberg, Vol. V, liner notes. KOCH International Classics, 3-7471-2 H1. New York, 2000.
  3. ^ Muxeneder, Therese. "Pelleas und Melisande." Arnold Schönberg Center. Retrieved 2011-12-16.

Further reading

External Links