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Variations for piano (Webern)
Variations for piano, Op. 27, is a twelve-tone piece for piano composed by Anton Webern in 1936. It consists of three movements:
Webern's only published work for solo piano, the Variations are one of his major instrumental works and a signal example of his late style. Webern dedicated the work to pianist Eduard Steuermann. It was premiered, however, (after months of coaching from Webern) by Peter Stadlen on 26 October 1937 in Vienna. Much later Stadlen produced the definitive interpretive edition of Op. 27, published by Universal Edition in 1979.
By the early 1930s, Webern was one of the composers and artists criticised by the Nazi Party, which was rapidly gaining power. By 1934, Webern's conducting career, a major source of income for the composer, was practically over, and he earned his living by teaching composition to a few private pupils. Despite the considerable financial disadvantages of this situation, the lack of a stable job provided Webern with more time to compose.
Opus 27 took Webern about a year to complete. The three movements were not composed in the order they appear in the work:
The piece is the only work for piano solo that was published by the composer and assigned an opus number. It was also the last work by Webern to be published by Universal Edition during his lifetime.
All three movements of the work are 12-tone pieces based on the following row (as found at the beginning of the second movement):
The work's title, Variations, is ambiguous. In a letter dated 18 July, Webern wrote: "The completed part is a variations movement; the whole will be a kind of 'Suite'". Only the third movement was completed at the time, and it is clearly a set of variations. The form of the other two movements conforms to the "Suite" plan: the first movement is a ternary form, A–B–A, and the second is a binary form. However, to refer to an entire work by the form of its last movement is very unusual, and numerous attempts have been made to explain the title.
Webern scholar Kathryn Bailey outlined three possible views on the structure of the piece. Webern's Variations may be considered any of these:
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Variations for piano (Webern)
Variations for piano, Op. 27, is a twelve-tone piece for piano composed by Anton Webern in 1936. It consists of three movements:
Webern's only published work for solo piano, the Variations are one of his major instrumental works and a signal example of his late style. Webern dedicated the work to pianist Eduard Steuermann. It was premiered, however, (after months of coaching from Webern) by Peter Stadlen on 26 October 1937 in Vienna. Much later Stadlen produced the definitive interpretive edition of Op. 27, published by Universal Edition in 1979.
By the early 1930s, Webern was one of the composers and artists criticised by the Nazi Party, which was rapidly gaining power. By 1934, Webern's conducting career, a major source of income for the composer, was practically over, and he earned his living by teaching composition to a few private pupils. Despite the considerable financial disadvantages of this situation, the lack of a stable job provided Webern with more time to compose.
Opus 27 took Webern about a year to complete. The three movements were not composed in the order they appear in the work:
The piece is the only work for piano solo that was published by the composer and assigned an opus number. It was also the last work by Webern to be published by Universal Edition during his lifetime.
All three movements of the work are 12-tone pieces based on the following row (as found at the beginning of the second movement):
The work's title, Variations, is ambiguous. In a letter dated 18 July, Webern wrote: "The completed part is a variations movement; the whole will be a kind of 'Suite'". Only the third movement was completed at the time, and it is clearly a set of variations. The form of the other two movements conforms to the "Suite" plan: the first movement is a ternary form, A–B–A, and the second is a binary form. However, to refer to an entire work by the form of its last movement is very unusual, and numerous attempts have been made to explain the title.
Webern scholar Kathryn Bailey outlined three possible views on the structure of the piece. Webern's Variations may be considered any of these: