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.”
I picked a random piece from YouTube. He did that 12 tone stuff.
To my untrained ear he sounds as if he is accompanied by a 3 year-old, or a cat.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bQHR_Z8XVvI
If these things were really that valuable it beggars belief that one would store them in a backyard shed.
At least use a fireproof safe, geez.
“Schoenberg. No loss at all.”
Really. I prefer music.
Verklärte Nacht. Thanks.
The scores were held in a digital back-up, but this was also destroyed in the fire.
= = =
Oops.
God hates twelve tone.
Someone wanted the current population out.
“Palisades was a beautiful place though, almost a movie set type perfect.”
CONDITIONS there were NEVER “perfect”.
I lived out there in the 1950s-1960s. I knew the area then. Wild fires in Southern California were not rare then.
I had a niece, who is now 51 years old, who went to college at Pepperdine, up the hill from Malibu. Just about sometime every year they were stuck at the campus, unable to get home due to flooding on, or muslides running down onto, PCH (Pacific Coast Highway). Twice the had to stay inside due to smoke from nearby wild fires. The wild fires neduded the hilsides and then the rains washed mud down the denuded hillsides. Everyone remembers it.
I could go on.
It’s absolutely amazing that someone would not place this type of stuff in a vault that are easily available whether in a bank or privately so that this stuff would’ve been impervious to fire and would have survived. Now he said he had a digital backup of everything and yet he kept the digital back up in the same place at the very least the digital back up should’ve been someplace.
Careful thinking of how to protect some of this stuff would’ve taken care of the problem. I confess that I am not familiar with that composer as far as I know. But that doesn’t mean that they weren’t valuable and meant something to people. The son just did not store this Bible stuff in a place that would’ve been totally secure.
The son had copies stored on site. That's a no-no. When industry professionals
back up digital records, there are always copies stored off site, and far away.
“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.”
The Santa Annas are dynamic and variable and their vagaries can alter the course of wildfires. This year they swept down the hills and out to the coast - as they have before from time to time, maybe not so often before when a wildfire was also present.
That insurance payment will take away some of the sadness. In fact, I bet they already have their tickets for many months in the Bahamas.
None were originals. So this could be an insurance scam.
What? No digital back up?
Hellooooo! Its 2025!
“ The scores were held in a digital back-up, but this was also destroyed in the fire.”
Lesson. To all of us.
Have this in a different place or online
All that matters is Frank Zappa’s vault is safe.
“Most of the original scores are held in a museum” according to the article. So the loss is really no big deal. But the insurance might be a big deal.
Yeah. No.
The scores were held in a digital back-up, but this was also destroyed in the fire.
Next time, use “Dropbox”.
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