Schoenberg: String Quartet No. 2, Op. 10

Description

This chamber music work, composed in 1907, No. 08, marks a turning point not only in Schoenberg's output, but also for the history of modern music in general. Major-Minor tonality, obligatory for centuries, is increasingly abandoned over the four movements in favor of a free atonality. This break with music-historical tradition goes hand-in-hand with a further breach of convention; in the last two movements, Schoenberg includes a solo soprano singing settings of two poems by Stefan George. with the transition to atonality, Schoenberg opens the way to a new musical language which was to lead to twelve-tone music a little later. Without question, his second String Quartet represents a landmark in the history of music.