Webern's Bach and the Dilemma of Austro-German Music Before the Anschluss

Abstract

Austro-German music has been deeply associated with both German and Austrian national identities, although Schoenberg bluntly claimed that only Austrians like he himself will uphold the future of German music. This perplexity of national and cultural identifications of the Austrians only intensified in 1933-1938, the period before Austria』sfinal Anschluss with Germany. After Schoenberg』s exile to the United States in 1933, the dilemma of Austro-German music was very much felt by his student Webern, who though far from an anti-Semite, had been under the sway of pan-German nationalism. And that dilemma was whether to follow the path of modernism, now condemned as (Jewish) cosmopolitanism, or to resort to romantic historicism, clinging to the national (German) heritage. After the exposure of Webern』s enthusiasm for the Nazi and for Hitler by Hans Moldenhauer in 1978, Webern studies were silent on this aspect for a decade. Then in the 90s there was a sea change from formal analysis to contextual criticism with Anne Shreffler (re)discovering Webern』s lyric impulse in 1994 and Julian Johnson exploring Webern』s preoccupation with nature and its roots in the aesthetics of romanticism in 1999. On the other hand, two conferences in Austria in 1990 and 1995 attempted to tackle the social and political dimensions of the Schoenberg school and Webern particularly. This study will proceed to decipher Webern』s inner conflict by looking at the genesis and reception of his Bach-related works in this period, i.e. the Quartet for clarinet, tenor saxophone, violin and piano op. 22 (1928–30), the orchestration of the six-part fugue (「ricercare」) from the Musical Offering (1934-35) and the String Quartet op. 28 (1936–38). In these works, the confrontation of modernism and historicism that induced the dilemma of Austro-German music were pervasively and deeply felt. New sources published recently such as Webern』s lecture notes (2002), his letters to Zemlinsky (1995) and to Jalowetz (1999), and other archival material will be incorporated for a contextual reading.