Lot 124: SCHOENBERG, ARNOLD.

REMARKABLE TEACHING MANUSCRIPT WITH AUTOGRAPH CORRECTIONS AND DRAFTS

containing sketches for the first movement of a serenade for string orchestra ("Serenade für Streichorchester"), in the hand of his pupil Fried Walter, extensively corrected by schoenberg and containing some fifty bars of music in his hand, unsigned, Schoenberg's additions notated in pencil on up to ten staves per page, with some passages deleted, errors by his pupil marked with crosses, and improved versions written by Schoenberg on a facing page, with a few annotations probably by Schoenberg; the manuscript further contains, in other hands, a title-page written in ink and pencil ("Serenade für Streichorchester...dazu Skizzen von Arnold Schoenberg!"), and notes and mottos apparently taken down from Schoenberg by Walter

6 pages, plus blanks, folio (c.33.5 x 27cms), 24-stave paper ("K.U.V. Beethoven Papier Nr.37 (24 Linien)"), Schoenberg's additions on 3 pages, one page cut down, the title marked in blue crayon ("zu 87"), no place or date [Berlin, c.1930]; together with 6 pages of further drafts in another hand

LITERATURE

P. Gradenwitz, Arnold Schoenberg und seine Meisterschüler, Berlin 1925-1933 (Vienna, 1998), p.150.

NOTE

Between 1925 and 1933, Schoenberg taught a masterclass for composition at the Preussische Akademie der Künste in Berlin. One of his pupils there was Fried Walter (1907-1996), later a repetiteur at the Berlin Staatsoper, who studied with Schoenberg during 1929 and 1930. A particularly remarkable feature of the manuscript is a page apparently containing sayings and mottos of the great teacher as jotted down by Walter ("...Motto: Wenn ich nun jetzt schon einmal letzten Endes den Gedenken habe, es zu überlegen...").

Schoenberg was one of the most important musical theorists and teachers of the twentieth century, Berg and Webern numbering among his most famous pupils. Manuscripts relating to Schoenberg's work as a teacher are rare.