Posted on 01/15/2025 2:04:35 PM PST by nickcarraway
Scores, letters and photographs held by Arnold Schoenberg’s publisher have been lost to the wildfires blazing across Los Angeles.
More than 100,000 scores by the 20th century composer Arnold Schoenberg have been destroyed in the LA wildfires, in what his son Larry Schoenberg has described as “a profound cultural blow.”
Larry Schoenberg ran Belmont Music Publishers and kept an archive of his father’s music and memorabilia in an outbuilding behind his Pacific Palisades home. Both buildings have fallen victim to the largest of several wildfires that have wreaked devastating destruction to the Los Angeles area in recent weeks.
“It’s brutal. We lost everything,” Larry Schoenberg told the New York Times.
The composer’s son, now 83 years old, stored over 100,000 of his father’s scores at Belmont, in addition to photographs, letters, books, posters and more. The scores were held in a digital back-up, but this was also destroyed in the fire.
Self-taught, and inspired by the likes of Wagner and Brahms, Schoenberg’s early works built on the lush, Romantic era style, before he began to develop the twelve-tone serialist technique that would define his legacy and cement him as one of the leading figures of 20th century classical music.
“There’s a finality here which is astonishing,” Larry Schoenberg said. “There’s no hope left that you’re going to find or retrieve anything. And that’s a different kind of grief.”
He added in a later statement: “For a company that focused exclusively on the works of Schoenberg, this loss represents not just a physical destruction of property but a profound cultural blow.”
The one mild respite amid the devastation is that no original scores were lost in the blaze. Most of these are held by a museum in Vienna, Schoenberg’s birthplace.
However, Belmont’s destruction means the loss of a vast library of performance scores, respected and valued by musicians worldwide for its close connection to the composer himself. Some have warned that the loss could lead to a pause in performances of Schoenberg’s work, as performers struggle to source alternative scores.
Belmont is ultimately hoping to recover its inventory, stating on its website: “We hope that in the near future we will be able to ‘rise from the ashes’ in a completely digital form.”
Larry Schoenberg commented that he would follow his father’s example as he comes to terms with the scale of his loss: “Whenever there was a difficulty, [Arnold Schoenberg] would express his frustration, then get to work on a solution. Despite all that has happened, we are trying to be very positive. There are no tears here.”
Schoenberg. No loss at all.
Let me respectfully disagree. The “Transfigured Night” sextet, written in his earlier romantic style, is a beautiful piece.
First Hunter’s paintings, now this. Civilization is crumbling before our eyes.
The score for ‘Concerto for Untuned Piano and Bowling Ball’ is lost? Oh, woe! Like the Library of Alexandria!
Verklaerte Nacht
I am with you, this is tragic for the family and a niche group but hardly a world cultural loss.
I have no sympathy for any material loss from these fires. Loss of life absolutely terrible, everything else nothing. Long overdue consequences for the CA population’s ideology as a whole.
Correct. I’m not sure how to put an umlaut over an “a” on a website, so I translated it.
Well said.
I would like to know what the son’s home in the Pacific Palisades cost or was worth. There was no place better to store such a valuable legacy???
Yes, with annual Santa Anna winds, periodic wild fires, periodic torrential rains washing away unstable Pacific Palisades hillsides, the area came with known periodic hazards. People ignored them, dwelling on the many beauties of the locations.
A lot of historical art has been lost in the fires. Old musical scores, photos, movie reels, paintings, etc. (Hunter Biden’s “paintings do not qualify as art).
Agreed.
Palisades was a beautiful place though, almost a movie set type perfect.
Let me respectfully disagree. The “Transfigured Night” sextet, written in his earlier romantic style, is a beautiful piece.
I just listened to a sample, I can hear the influence on early ELO.
Atonal is somewhat of an acquired taste.
Respect it? Sure.
Admire it’s groundbreaking? Sure.
Have a glass of wine and mellow out? Nope.
Maybe a Speedball and a flask of Dirty Mezcal?
Rock on Bruh!
Personal items often have value on the collectors’ market, but what is the importance of these scores? I assume the music is all written down and copies are available. The story notes that the scores that burned were not originals. They would seem to be easily replaceable.
gee, it is a shame that no one ever thought to record the music, copy the sheet music, publish it, etc.
People figured the real fire threat was up in the hills, like Brentwood, Encino, Bel Air, Tarzana, etc.
Malibu and PP have hilly areas farther inland. But unexpectedly, it was coastal Malibu and Pacific Palisades that were hardest hit; the areas nearer the beach than to the hills.
& - # - 2 - 2 - 8 - ;
all together no spaces, delete the hyphens
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