Schoenberg's Early Years Bibliography

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Arnold Schoenberg (b.1874-1951) was born in to a poor orthodox Jewish family who were of Hungarian decent. His family had no musical affiliation apart from his brother and cousin who were excellent singers and although his parents did enjoy listening to music, they were unable to contribute towards his future music career. His mother was from Prague, his father was from Bratislava and was also a shoemaker. He started learning the violin at the age of 8 and started composing violin duets which started to reveal a natural flair for composing. After this, he was taught counterpoint and harmony by his first teacher Oskar Adler. Schoenberg had a classmate that played the viola which then encouraged him to advance to writing for both violin and cello. Adler leaned him toward learning the cello so that he could play in quartets and trio's with his friends. He began composing for quartets although he was missing the key to progress with his techniques. This was a latter copy of the Meyers Grosses Konversations-Lexikon encyclopaedia which contained how to create the sonata form first movement of quartets. His family had to get the book through their instalment plan. His father passed away due to pneumonia when he was sixteen so he got a job as a bank clerk to support his family's financial situation. He did this for five years and also met Alexander Von Zemlinsky (1871-1942) who was the a rising composer himself and was a conductor of the polyhymnia amateur orchestra where Schoenberg also played the cello. He quit his job and became a conductor for the Mödling Choral Society and also became a “chorusmaster of the Stockerau Metalworkers' Singers' Union” Zimlinsky later became Schoenberg's brother in law after he married Mathilde Von Zimlinsky. Upon becoming good friends, Zemlinsky gave Shoenberg further instruction on harmony, “counterpoint and some general advice”. This

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