A couple of composer's on this week's Death Mask exhibit. First the Viennese composer, Alban Berg (1885-1935). 
Berg was a student of Schoenberg and an atonal contemporary of Webern. Like Stravinsky, one of his works caused a riot when performed (apparently there was more audience violence in Vienna before the Great War than in punk Britain in the '70s). Berg died of blood poisoning at the age of 50, maybe from a bug bite according to the popular wisdom of the wiki. I'm listening to his String Quartet/Lyric Suite for the first time on Napster-to-go as I make this post and it sounds pretty good.
And he's not one of my favorites, but I find his death mask one of the most disturbing I've seen so far. Richard Wagner below:
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Death Mask Tuesday (Decomposing Composers Edition)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Yes! I got into Berg through Glenn Gould's 1958 recording of his Op. 1, Piano Sonata. After reading this I'm listening to the string quartet again and it's lovely, spidery and delicate. Wagner's mask is decidedly unsettling.
How cool. I actually like the Wagner mask. I see it as catching him in mid-chuckle. He probably never chuckled in real life, but if he had that would be about the extent of it.
Wagner's death mask looks like he's happy. What are you, a wimp?
Post a Comment