Among these pupils are Egon Wellesz (1885) who more than the other disciples has broken away from the master. He has gone his way in writing music for the stage and combining the old ideas of ballet and orchestral music with Greek drama in a modern dance drama. He has also written interesting chamber and orchestral music. Dr. Wellesz is also an authority on musical history; he has written many books and articles on the subject, especially on early opera, Byzantine and Oriental music. He has written a book on Schoenberg (1921).
Alban Berg (1885), also a Schoenberg pupil, has written unusually fine chamber music and a new opera, Wozzek, fragments of which were played at a festival in Prague (Czecho-Slovakia) in May, 1925, by the International Society of Contemporary Music, a movement most valuable in encouraging and developing modern music. This society holds yearly meetings in Europe, at which are heard the works of all the young composers of the world, each country having a branch, which sends its share of new works to make the festival’s programs.
Others of the Schoenberg group are Anton von Webern (1883), Paul Pisk, Karl Horovitz (1884–1925), Ernest Krenek, and Ernest Toch (1887).
Erich Korngold
Erich Wolfgang Korngold (1898) startled the musical world, just before the War, by the astonishing compositions he wrote as a little boy. Among these were orchestral works and a piano sonata of extraordinary promise. He was born in Vienna and is the son of a musician and musical critic. Young Korngold is known in America as the composer of Die Todte Stadt (The Dead City) an opera in which the soprano, Maria Jeritza, made her first appearance at the Metropolitan Opera House. In many ways the opera goes back to the old pre-Wagner form and is full of melody, unusual in a young 20th century composer! He has written other operas bordering on the lighter Viennese operetta and has kept away from the Schoenberg influence.
Modern German Music
Richard Strauss was the last of the great classic school of German composers, which for two hundred years had led the world in music. Curious as it seems, he has not influenced directly the younger composers, who turned to Debussy, Busoni, Schoenberg and Stravinsky. (Page [410].)
Busoni the Great
Ferruccio Busoni (1866–1924) although an Italian, had a strong influence in two fields of German music, that of piano playing and composing. He lived in Berlin and was one of the brilliant thinkers and musicians of the period. He left chamber music and orchestral works, also several operas, one of which, The Harlequin, finished just before his untimely death, combines traditional form with radical ideas. His sonatinas for piano and a set of studies on American Indian Themes are important. He made a deep study of all methods, old and new, and gave his pupils the advantage of this wide experience.
Although the young Germans are not copying the huge symphonic form of Bruckner and Mahler, these two have gained greatly in popularity and are serving as models. Hans Pfitzner (1869), opera composer, is one of the most German of the living composers of the pre-war period; Franz Schreker (1878), an Austrian, living in Berlin, has taught many of the younger composers. He writes operas and songs. Schoenberg, although in Vienna, is felt even in Berlin.