Mahler / Schoenberg / Chiejina - Transfigured [CD]

Known for it's championship of neglected repertoire; the Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective presents a programme of works by members of the Second Viennese School; based around Schoenberg's Verklärte Nacht. Probably Schoenberg's best-known piece - in either of it's two orchestral versions or the original string sextet version heard here; Verklärte Nacht is certainly not neglected! The Collective has chosen to surround it; however; with works that are much less well known; producing a fascinating and rewarding programme. Schoenberg composed the work in 1899; whilst on holiday with his friend and fellow composer Alexander Zemlinsky and Zemlinsky's sister; Mathilde; whom Schoenberg would marry two years later. Zemlinsky's Maiblumen blühten überall; for soprano and string sextet; was never completed; intended originally to be a much larger work. Webern studied composition with both Zemlinsky and Schoenberg. His Piano Quintet may; like Zemlinsky's composition; have been conceived a part of a larger work; but only this one movement was ever composed. Alma Schindler was another pupil of Zemlinsky; one with whom he developed a deep romantic infatuation. Their relationship ended when she herself fell in love with Gustav Mahler who; when they married; famously forbade her from pursuing her career as a composer. The four songs included here (arranged for soprano and string sextet by Tom Poster) are embedded in the soundworld of Zemlinsky and Schoenberg; and offer an intriguing glimpse of what she might have composed in other circumstances