# Another scandalous concert in 1913



## Lunasong (Mar 15, 2011)

I got this straight from Wiki:

The _Skandalkonzert_ of March 31, 1913, was a concert of the Wiener Konzertverein (Vienna Concert Society) conducted by Arnold Schoenberg in the Great Hall of the Musikverein. The audience, shocked by the expressionism and experimentalism of the Second Viennese School, began rioting, and the concert was ended prematurely. The fight between a concert organizer and composer Oscar Straus led to a trial.

The program listed:
*Anton von Webern: _Six Pieces for Orchestra_, Op. 6
*Alexander von Zemlinsky: _Four Orchestral Songs on poems by Maeterlinck_
*Arnold Schoenberg: _Chamber Symphony No. 1,_ Op. 9
*Alban Berg: _Five Orchestral Songs on Picture-Postcard Texts by Peter Altenberg,_ Op. 4. Both the lyrical and musical side of this premiere were seen as provocative.
*The concert was ended before the scheduled performance of Gustav Mahler's "Now the sun wants to rise as brightly" (No. 1 from the _Kindertotenlieder_)

During Berg's songs the audience called for both poet and composer to be committed, despite it being public knowledge that Altenberg was already committed to an asylum at the time. Though not present at the concert he was granted leave to attend the dress-rehearsal that morning and three days later he wrote a prose sketch depicting Alma Mahler there. At the concert it was during Berg's songs that the fighting began. At the trial, Straus commented that the thud of the punch had been the most harmonious sound at the entire concert. For Berg's work the _Skandalkonzert _had lasting consequences: the songs were not performed again until 1952, and the full score did not appear in print until 1966.

Historical context
The first performance of Schoenberg's _Gurrelieder_ was held on February 23, 1913, in the Great Hall of the Musikverein, under the direction of Franz Schreker, and was an overwhelming success. But the composer, offended by the previous conservative attitude of the Viennese public, refused to accept the applause. In return, the audience took revenge a few weeks later in the next concert of contemporary works there. Press reports from the period mention tumultuous riots: the followers of Schoenberg, his student, and opponents yelling at each other, throwing things, disturbing the performance, destroying furniture, etc. Several times, conservatives outraged by the audience cursing, climbed the stage to slap around Schoenberg.

The famous fracas at the premiere of Igor Stravinsky's _Le Sacre du Printemps_ took place in Paris two months later, on 29 May 1913.


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## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

I listened to the whole program on the anniversary! Aside from the Zemlinsky, the pieces are all relatively well-known today.


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