2022年8月14日日曜日

Pierrot Lunaire Op.21 by Arnold Schoenberg; Jan DeGaetani; Arthur Weisberg Nonesuch (H-71251) Publication date 1971

 H-71251 (Stereo) 



WOLD STOROLRO 

PIERROT IL MIRE oro 



Jan LeGae Oil. VOICE The art of every age eitan a bow works that we all 



must confront. Some are seminal, some culminatory, and 

some — like Pierrot Lunaire — demand our response 

because of their inner strength, as well as the historical 

') Emoorary ei [ WEN Ce moment that they reflect. Although Schoenberg himself, 



atter he had developed the twelve-tone system, was to 



give up the contextual atonality of Pierrot and his other 

rh | - compositions from the same period, they must all be 

UT C COI UIC oO considered crucial as specific steps toward the gener- 

: ality of the twelve-tone system. 


onesuc: Not only must every literate listener know Pierrot 

Lunaire and come to terms with it; every composer must 

deal with it. Indeed, since it was written no composer 

has escaped its reckoning. Stravinsky recalled hearing 

an early performance and called it ‘'the most prescient 

confrontation in my life''; many others might echo his 


response. 


How best should a listener today approach Pierrot? 

One way is internally — that is, by dealing with the 

work's moment-by-moment continuity, the shitting com- 

plex of pitch and rhythmic relations, the play of instru- 

mental sonorities, and the progress of the text. Another 

is externally — the over-all shape of the piece, the bal- 

ance of its three parts, the permutation of the instru- 

mental combinations throughout it, and the form of the 

text itself. 


In considering Pierrot from the inside, we are met ath 

many obstacles. For it sums up, indeed exhausts, Schoen- 

berg's attempts to replace the pitch-organizing system 

of tonality with a contextual approach — that is, each 


_- work built from its own unique autonomous structural 

principle. For this reason, the way the notes move from 

moment to moment is sometimes hard to follow. This is 

only natural, because at the time of its composition 

Schoenberg himself was searching, and hence many of 

the local decisions in Pierrot were obviously made in- 

tuitively, ad hoc. Thus it is impossible ‘for the mind to 

draw from the work's unfolding a sense of general law or 

pattern being observed, as one can when listening to 

tonal or twelve-tone music. Even though the phrase- 

shapes and other gestural entities in the work help to 

draw notes together, one can never know what will hap- 

pen next — there is no principle by which the ear can 

predict. This is what still makes Pierrot, after sixty years, 

new, abrasive, exciting, and even frightening. Yet, 

though unpredictable, it never seems arbitrary. In re-— 

ality, Schoenberg's seemingly intuitive pitch choices are 

actually the result of a process of numerous elisions of 

the more slowly-paced relations expressed in previous 

music, here compressed to enormous density. However, 

this elliptical process is too intense and strenuous to be 

used in the creation of the whole music of a composer's 

life, for as a device or technique it is not capable of 

relaxation—the same rapid rate of unfolding persists 

throughout. Indeed, if the work's thirty-five minutes were 

not divided among so many separate numbers, this har- 

monic density might become problematic. But its time 

is broken up, thus relieving by external means the in- 

tense internal compression. 









MORTON GREEN 

MEMORIAL 

RECORD LIBRARY 









Considering Pierrot externally —which is by no 

means to suggest superficially — we must realize that 

one of its most important aspects is in its unique mar- 

riage of text and tone, its dependence on word in a 

way unprecedented in tonal music. This relation mani- 

fests itself in many ways, but most striking is the very 

means by which the text is projected — Schoenberg's 

famous "invention," Sprechstimme (a pitched declama- 

tion, of an intensity almost verging on song). | suspect 



that beyond any practical concern (including the rela- 



tively greater ease of speaking as opposed to singing, 

and the potentially swifter delivery of the text), beyond 

any desire (never very strong in Schoenberg anyway) to 

be "modern," Jay a notion of a new means of fusing 

words and music, of bringing speech and song into 

closer harmony, by creating a vocal projection half 

spoken and half sung. His success in this direction can 

be seen in the fact that Pierrot, although not Schoen- 

berg's last work before the years-long silence in which 

he conceived the twelve-tone system, may be called the 

most complete. It is that because its form — directly 

eae on the shape of the text — is so clear in the 

arge. 


The succession of Pierrot's twenty-one numbers and 

their ordering in three parts are discussed in my trans- 

lating colleague's notes, and | will not rehearse them 

here. What was specifically important to Schoenberg 

was the decision to create a work of so many short 

numbers: his musical speech at the time would have 

rendered virtually impossible the creation of a large, 

continuous form. At this compositional stage, the use 

of a repetitive poetic form ne rondeau) multiplied over 

and over clearly provided him with a sense of stability 

and security, despite the variety of ways in which he 

treated the individual rondeaux, for his mind could thus 

grasp entire the unfolding of each short movement. And 

as these short movements served to clarify the prob- 

lems of composing for him, so do they serve the same 

function for us in listening; they can be grasped in their 

entirety, remembered, and retained in the hearer's mind 

to form building-blocks of the larger continuity that is 

the work as a whole. 


| have not tried to describe the complex compositional 

devices used in Pierrot, although a deeper understand- 

ing of the work does require at least an awareness of its 

various contrapuntal operations. For present purposes, 

| have felt it more important to attempt to establish a 

basic approach to the work, for its abruptions still make 

it difficult; even at this late date, listening to it occa- 

sionally reminds one of attempts to befriend a porcu- 

pine. It is also true, of course, that much of the soni¢ 

surface of the piece nowadays provides the listener with 

a rather conventional impression, and it is easy to see in 

Pierrot Wagnerian, not to mention Mahlerian, gestures 

and phrase-shapes. Moreover, after the Pers 

system had become established in Schoenberg's mind, 

the expressionistic rhetoric of the earlier compositions, 

including Pierrot, tended to remain in the surface of his 

music, although his success in mastering basic structural 

questions now enabled him to conceive and execute 

large continuous forms. 



—CHARLES WUORINEN 



In 1960, Arthur Weisberg and about a dozen out- 

standing New York instrumentalists, drawn from such 

notable ensembles as the New York Woodwind Quintet, 

the Beaux Arts Quartet, the Claremont Quartet, the 

New York Brass Quintet, and the Manhattan Percussion 

Ensemble, formed the Contemporary Chamber En- 

semble and began giving concerts of modern music. The 






H-71251 (Stereo) 

nonesuch 






ARNOLD SCHOENBERG 

(1874-1951) 

PIERROT LUNAIRE, Op. 21 (1912} 

Thrice Seven Poems from Albert Giraud's Pierrot Lunaire 

(German by Otto Erich Hartleben) 



Side One (18:46) 



PART | 

Mondestrunken — Columbine — 

Der Dandy — Eine blasse Wascherin — 

Valse de Chopin — Madonna — 

Der kranke Mond (11:55) 



PART II 

Nacht — Gebet an Pierrot — 

Raub — Rote Messe — Galgenlied (6:44) 



Side Two (15:41) 



PART II (concl.} 

Enthauptung — Die Kreuze (4:24) 



PART III 

Heimweh — Gemeinheit! — Parodie — 



Der Mondfleck — Serenade — 

Heimfahrt — O alter Duft (11:12) 



JAN DeGAETANI, voice 

THE CONTEMPORARY CHAMBER ENSEMBLE 

ARTHUR WEISBERG, conductor 



Gilbert Kalish, piano 

Thomas Nyfenger, flute & piccolo 

Arthur Bloom, clarinet & bass clarinet 

Jeanne Benjamin, violin & viola 

Michael Rudiakov, cello 



engineering & tape editing: Marc J. Aubort, Joanna Nickrenz (Elite Recordings, Inc.) 

a Dolby-system recording 

texts & translations enclosed 









Ensemble's first five years of diligent efforts and out- 

standing performances were rewarded by a grant from 

the Rockefeller Foundation to set up a three-year resi- 

dency at Rutgers University. This residency allowed the 

Ensemble ample time to develop finished performances 

of even the most difficult of contemporary pieces. Dur- 

ing this period, the Ensemble built up a repertory of 

about 100 new works, presented over 70 concerts, pro- 

duced two programs for National Educational Tx 'evision, 

and read and rehearsed a vast number of scores at 

weekly composers’ workshops. Since the termination of 

this residency, the Contemporary Chamber Ensemble 

has continued to perform at colleges and universities 

throughout the country, and is justly proud to have been 

invited to perform at the Library of Congress for the 

last nine consecutive years. 


In 1969, Nonesuch Records released three albums con- 

taining eight works, all premieres, recorded by the Con- 

temporary Chamber Ensemble under a grant from the 

Martha Baird Rockefeller Foundation (SPECTRUM: New 

American Music,H-71219, H-71220, H-71221). Each of 

these albums won honors for the composers from the 

1970 Koussevitzky International Recording Award. The 

Ensemble has also recorded for Acoustic Research and 



CRI. 



Mezzo-soprano Jan DeGaetani, born in Ohio, is a 

graduate of the Juilliard School of Music. Since her New 

York recital debut under a grant from the William Sulli- 

van Musical Foundation, Miss DeGaetani has matured 

into "that rare singer who has not only a rich, well- 

produced voice and warm feeling for singing, but also 

a precise intonation, an equally exact sense of rhythm 

and a handsome stage presence’ (New York Times). She 

has been heard in oratorio, opera, chamber music, and 

solo recitals, on radio and television in the U.S.A. and 

Europe, and is especially noted for her performances of 

contemporary works. She has been a member of the 

Abbey Singers, the Gramercy Chamber Ensemble, and 

the Riverside Chamber Singers. As soloist she has ap- 

peared with the Beaux-Arts String Quartet, the Fine 

Arts Quartet, the Lark Quintet, the Penn Contemporary 

Players, New York Pro Musica, Gunther Schuller's 20th- 

Century Innovations, and with the the Contemporary 

Chamber Ensemble. 


Miss DeGaetani conducts master classes, was for 

three summers Artist-in-Residence at the University of 

Wisconsin, and is a former faculty member of the 

Juilliard School of Music. She has perfomed in record- 

ings for Decca, CRI, Music Guild, Acoustic Research, 

and Nonesuch Records. 






coordinator/Teresa Sterne art direction/Robert L. Heimall cover art/Peter Schaurnann cover design/Richard J. Nebiolo cover concept: Hess and/or Antupit 

Printed in U.S.A. Nonesuch Records #15 Columbus Circle * New York, N.Y. 10023 @ Copyright 1971 by Nonesuch Records 



SHOREPAK-U.S, PATENT NO. 3,301,467 



ARNOLD SCHOENBERG 

(1874-1951) 



PIERROT LUNAIRE, Op. 21 (1912) 



Thrice Seven Poems from Albert Giraud’s Pierrot Lunaire 

(German by Otto Erich Hartleben) 



Arnold Schoenberg wrote Pierrot Lunaire in 1912 at the request of 

the actress Albertine Zehme, whose acquaintance the composer had 

made shortly after he moved from Vienna to Berlin in 1911. As usual, 

Schoenberg wrote with incredible speed: all but two of the pieces were 

composed between March 12 and May 30, and fourteen of them re- 

quired no more than a single day each for completion. The actress had 

originally wanted only a piano accompaniment to her recitation; 

Schoenberg extracted permission to use the other instruments one by 

one. Thus economic considerations played a significant role in the form- 

ation of the ensemble that lends Pierrot its remarkable timbral profile. 


The first performance took place on October 16, 1912, in a small 

theater in Berlin. Frau Zehme recited in a Columbine costume, while 



PAIR T “il 



1. MOONDRUNK 

flute. violin, cello, piano 



1. MONDESTRUNKEN 



Schoenberg conducted the musicians behind a transparent scrim. 



Schoenberg gave an important key to his attitude towards the texts 

in his foreword to the published score, when he wrote: ‘In this work, 

the performers at no time have the task of shaping the mood ana 

character of the individual pieces according to the meaning of the 

words, but rather according to the music. To whatever extent the com- 

poser felt a tone-pictorial representation of the actions and feelings 

indicated in the text to be important, it is simply to be found in the 

music. Where the performer does not find such representation, he 

should refrain from adding anything that the composer did not want. 

In this instance he would not be adding, but rather detracting.”’ 



In the resonant bronze basin 


Water spurts noisily with metallic laughter. 


With a fantastical ray of light 


The moon strikes sparks from the crystal flacons. 



/n tonender, bronzener Schale 


Lacht hell die Fontaine, metallischen Klangs. 

Mit einem phantastischen Lichtstrahl 

Erleuchtet der Mond die krystalinen Flacons. 



Den Wein, den man mit Augen trinkt, 

GieBt Nachts der Mond in Wogen nieder, 

Und eine Springflut iberschwemmt 


Den stillen Horizont. 



Geliiste schauerlich und siB, 

Durchschwimmen ohne Zahl die Fluten! 

Den Wein, den man mit Augen trinkt, 

GieBt Nachts der Mond in Wogen nieder. 



Der Didter, den die Andacht treibt, 

Berauscht sich an dem heilgen Tranke, 


Gen Himmel wendet er verziickt 


Das Haupt und taumelnd saugt und schlirit er 

Den Wein, den man mit Augen trinkt. 



2. COLUMBINE 



The wine that only eyes can drink 


Pours nighttimes from the moon in waves, 

And its springtime tide floods over 


The horizon’s quiet bowl. 



Aching lusts, shocking and sweet, 


Float beyond measure in the gushing philter! 

The wine that only eyes can drink, 


Pours nighttimes from the moon in waves. 



The poet, under piety’s cover, 


Gets fuddled on the holy brew; 


Towards Heaven, rapt, tilts back his head 

And giddily reeling laps and swills 


The wine that only eyes can drink. 



2. COLUMBINE 



flute, clarinet in A, violin, piano 



Des Mondlichts bleiche Bluten, 

Die weiBen Wunderrosen, 

Blihn in den Julinachten— 


O brach ich eine nur! 



Mein banges Leid zu lindern, 

Such ich am dunklen Strome 

Des Mondlichts bleiche Bliten, 

Die weiBen Wunderrosen. 



Gestillt war all mein Sehnen, 

Dirft ich so marchenheimlich, 

So selig leis—entblattern 


Auf deine braunen Haare 


Des Mondlichts bleiche Bliten! 



3. DER DANDY 



The moonlight’s pallid blossoms, 

The white and wondrous roses, 

Bloom in midsummer midnights — 

O! could | pluck but one! 



To still my luckless grieving 


| seek in Lethe’s murky stream 

The moonlight’s pallid blossoms, 

The white and wondrous roses. 



All my yearning would be sated 

Could I, in fairytale secret, 


In gentle bliss . . . rip petal from petal 

And scatter in your auburn hair 


The moonlight’s pallid blossoms. 



3. THE DANDY 



piccolo, clarinet in A, piano 



Mit einem phantastischen Lichtstrahl 

Erleuchtet der Mond die krystalinen Flacons 

Auf dem schwarzen, hochheiligen Waschtisch 

Des schweigenden Dandys von Bergamo. 



With a fantastical ray of light 


The moon strikes sparks from the crystal flacons 

On that ebony high altar, the washstand 


Of the laconic dandy from ‘Bergamo. 



Pierrot mit dem wachsernen Antlitz 

Steht sinnend und denkt: wie er heute 

sich schminkt? 



Fort schiebt er das Rot und des Orients Griin 

Und bemalt sein Gesicht in erhabenem Stil 



Mit einem phantastischen Mondstrahl. 



4, EINE BLASSE WASCHERIN 



He of the waxworks face, Pierrot, 


Racks his brain and thinks: How shall | 

make me up today? 


Vetoes rouge and Orient green 


And paints his phizz in loftier style — 


With a fantastical ray of light. 



4. A PALE WASHERWOMAN 



flute, clarinet in A, violin 



Eine blasse Wascherin 


Wascht zur Nachtzeit bleiche Tiicher; 

Nackte, silberweipe Arme 


Streckt sie nieder in die Flut. 



Durch die Lichtung schleichen Winde, 

Leis bewegen sie den Strom. 


Eine blasse Wascherin 


Wascht zur Nachtzeit bleiche Tiicher. 



Und die sanfte Magd des Himmels, 

Von den Zweigen zart umschmeichelt, 

Breitet auf die dunklen Wiesen 


thre lichtgewobnen Linnen— 


Eine blasse Wascherin. 



5. VALSE DE CHOPIN 



A washerwoman pale as a sheet 

Washes nights her bleachpale linen, 

Dips naked arms white as silver 

Glistening down into the stream. 



Through the clearing sidle breezes 

Gently ruffling up the river. 


A washerwoman pale as a sheet 

Washes nights her bleachpale linen. 



Heaven's lovely livid scullion, 


By the branches gently tickled, 


Lays out upon the darkling meadows 

Her bedlinen woven of threads of light — 

A washerwoman pale as a sheet. 



5. VALSE DE CHOPIN 



flute, clarinet in A, bass clarinet in Bb, piano 



Wie ein blasser Tropfen Bluts 

Farbt die Lippen einer Kranken, 

Also ruht auf diesen Tonen 


Ein vernichtungssiichtger Reiz. 



Wilder Lust Accorde storen 


Der Verzweiflung eisgen Traum— 

Wie ein blasser Tropfen Bluts 

Farbt die Lippen einer Kranken. 



Hei8 und jauchzend, sii6 und schmachtend, 



Melancholisch diistrer Walzer, 

Kommst mir nimmer aus den Sinnen! 

Haftest mir an den Gedanken, 

Wie ein blasser Tropfen Bluts! 



Like a spitwatered drop of blood 

Rouging the lips of the phthisic sick. 

So upon these morbid tones 


There lies a soul-destroying spell. 



Crimson chords of fierce desire 

Splatter despair’s white-icy dream — 

Like a spitwatered drop of blood 

Rouging the lips of the phthisic sick. 



Hot exultant, sweetly longing, 

Melancholy nightwood waltz 

Nagging sleepless at my brain, 

Cleaving to my every thought, 

Like a spitwatered drop of blood! 



TRANSLATOR’S NOTE: 



It comes near to foolishness to venture yet another translation of the 

free version that the German playwright Otto Erich Hartleben 

(1864-1905) made of the youthful but subtly Saturnian post-Verlaine 

French poems that the Belgian critic and dramatist Albert Giraud 

(1860-1929) published in 1884 in a slim volume now very rare indeed; 

to attempt, over and beyond this, to convey some of the passionately 

expressionistic nuances those poems were given in the diffracting mirror 

of Schoenberg's music is to tread where no fool rushes. What is offered 

here is, for those reasons, neither a syllable-for-syllable nor note-for- 

note translation, though here and there the words fall right and key 

words receive some of the emphasis they have in the music. Nor is it 

always literal. In a few places, to give something of the emotional 

musical meaning, a hint has been borrowed from the French originals 

(did Schoenberg know them?) and—more often—from the music itself. 

Fairly often, words were chosen to reflect not the sound of the German 

text but that of the music. 


Solemn as we now tend to be about Schoenberg and his works, we 

are likely to overlook the adroit wit with which he manipulated these 

sharp-etched rondeaux. Even more, we.fail to see that Pierrot Lunaire 

was a work of its time, a genuinely art-nouveau obeisance to much the 

same themes treated in Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde, first performed 

just one year earlier. For all the intense concentration and virtually 

chemical refinement of Schoenberg’s Op. 21, it too opens with its poet 

drunk on wine and likewise closes with a return homeward, with an 

appreciation of “die liebe Welt’ of day, after night thoughts and 

sorrows, and with the poet-composer’s surrender to the eternal and the 

infinite which, in the extraordinary compression of Pierrot, means to 

the “infinite nutshell’ of the handful of notes—not one too many or 

too few—to which Schoenberg set the words ‘‘und traum hinaus in selge 

Weiten." 


Schoenberg himself chose from a total of 50 the ‘‘thrice seven” 

poems he wished to set (a number corresponding to the opus number of 

the work but certainly determined also by his lifelong preoccupation 

with Cabalistic number-symbolism as applied here to a text that was 

obviously of personal emotional significance to him), and his choice 

was surely influenced by thought of Mahler’s titanic but intimate 

symphony for two voices and orchestra. As with Mahler, there is 

deliberate confusion—interpenetration, interaction, fusion and dis- 

‘persion—between the | and the third-person-singular, between Poet and 



Pierrot (who, in fact, appears in person in only eleven of the 

twenty-one poems). Further, the work is genuinely cyclical, with what 

is tantamount to a narrative underlying it, though all its events would 

seem to take place in the mind or nightmare rather than in or on 

Mahler’s “beloved earth.”’ 


In the first song, the Poet (the composer) gets divinely drunk on 

moonwine, and what follows in the first seven is a whirlpool of love and 

sexual longing (nos. 2, 4, 5, 7), neurasthenic tancies (5, 7), religious 

hysteria (6), Beardsleyan trifling (3), and a nightworld metaphor that 

seems like a sketch for Anna Livia Plurabelle (4). In the second 

sequence of seven, the plunge is taken—literally—into the underworld 

with obsessions of guilt and expiation, linked with the loss of innocence 

(9), with pillage (10), blasphemy (11), or the voluntary martyrdom that 

Schoenberg himself, we know, conceived to be the artist’s lot (14). The 

final sequence represents the slow climb out of the lower depths, with a 

prise de conscience (15), one last teasing (17), and a farewell to vulgar 

sadism (16; Hartleben, interestingly, foisted on Giraud’s Pierrot cruel 

the title of Gemeinheit!—Vulgar Horseplay!—and Schoenberg retained 

it), a final obsession with guilt of a sort to make a Freudian smile (18), 

a Pierrot still zany and prankish but—the music tells us—already caught 

up in gentler dreams (19), the journey out of the art-nouveau gothic 

night of the North with its vaulted sepulchers and storks and gaunt 

Madonnas southward to the sun (20), and the homecoming (21), the 

Poet’s sober return to himself, his rejection of moondrunkenness in 

favor of the stirrings of spirit and senses in ‘‘daytime thoughts of world 

| love’: Pierrot Lunaire was, in fact, the last major work but one of 

Schoenberg’s expressionist aesthetic, to be succeeded after a virtual 

silence of eleven years by his neo-classical first experiments with the 

“method of composition with twelve tones.” 


We are not likely now ever to learn if the composer had in mind the 

program his work reveals, but his choice of poems, and his ordering and 

setting of them, is no less meaningful for being conscious or 

unconscious. By ten years later he could write about them (in a letter 

to Marya Freund, December 30, 1922): “| apparently have taken a 

decidedly more naive view of these poems than most people, and | am 

still not entirely doubtful that this is so thoroughly unjustified. 

Anyway | am not responsible for what people insist on reading into the 

words. If they were musical, not one of them would give a damn for the 

words. Instead they would go away whistling the tunes.” 



nonesuch 






H-71251 (Stereo) 



coordinator/Teresa Sterne cover art/Peter Schaumann 



cover design/Richard J. Nebiolo 



art direction/Robert L. Heimall 



© Copyright 1971 by Nonesuch Records e 15 Columbus Circle e New York, N. Y. 10023 © Printed in U.S.A. 



6. MADONNA 



6. MADONNA 



flute, bass clarinet in Bb, violin, cello, piano 



Steig, o Mutter aller Schmerzen, 

Auf den Altar meiner Verse! 

Blut aus deinen magren Briisten 

Hat des Schwertes Wut vergossen. 



Deine ewig frischen Wunden 

Gleichen Augen, rot und offen. 

Steig, o Mutter aller Schmerzen, 

Auf den Altar meiner Verse! 



In den abgezehrten Handen 


Haltst du deines Sohnes Leiohe. 


Ihn zu zeigen aller Menschheit— 

Doch der Blick der Menschen meidet 

Dich, o Mutter aller Schmerzen! 



7. DER KRANKE MOND 



Du nachtig todeskranker Mond 


Dort auf des Himmels schwarzem Pfuhl, 

Dein Blick, so fiebernd bergroB, 


Bannt mich wie fremde Melodie. 



An unstillbarem Liebesleid 


Stirbst du, an Sehnsucht, tief erstickt, 

Du nachtig todeskranker Mond 


Dort auf des Himmels schwarzem Pfuhl. 



Den Liebsten, der im Sinnenrausch 

Gedankenlos zur Liebsten schleicht, 

Belustigt deiner Strahlen Spiel— 

Dein bleiches, qualgebornes Blut, 

Du nachtig todeskranker Mond. 



Mount, Madonna of all sorrows, 

Upon the altar of my verses! 


Blood from out thy milkless breasts 

Spilled at the saber’s angry slash. 



Thy wounds, fresh always, weeping blood, 

Are sleepless eyes, red and staring. 


Mount, Madonna of all sorrows, 


Upon the altar of my verses! 



In thy fleshless wasted hands 


Thou holdst the corpse that was thy Son 

As tidings to a careless world 


But still they turn their eyes away 


From thee, Madonna of all sorrows. 



7. THE SICK MOON 

flute 



You darkgloomed lifesick deathbed moon 

Splayed white on night-sky’s. pillow, 

Your huge and feverswollen face 


Holds me fast, like alien tones. 



From stanchless quenchless ache of love 

You'll die of yearning, choked and smothered, 

You darkgloomed lifesick deathbed moon 

Splayed white on night-sky’s pillow. 



The lovedrunk lover on his way 

Thoughtless to his lover’s bed 


Applauds as charming silver rays 


The hueless pain-born blood you spill, 

You darkgloomed lifesick deathbed moon. 



PART Il 



8. NACHT (Passacaglia) 



8. NIGHT (Passacaglia) 



bass clarinet in Bb, cello, piano 



Finstre, schwarze Riesenfalter 

Toteten der Sonne Glanz. 


Ein geschlossnes Zauberbuch, 

Ruht der Horizont—verschwiegen. 



Aus dem Qualm verlorner Tiefen 

Steigt ein Duft, Erinnrung mordend! 

Finstre, schwarze Reisenfalter 

Téteten der Sonne Glanz. 



Und vom Himmel erdenwarts 

Senken sich mit schweren Schwingen 

Unsichtbar die Ungetiime 


Auf die Menschenherzen nieder . . . 

Finstre, schwarze Riesentalter. 



9. GEBET AN PIERROT 



Sinister giant black butterflies 


Eclipse the blazing disk of sun. 


Like a sealed-up book of wizard’s spells 

Sleeps the horizon—secret silent. 



From dank forgotten depths of Lethe 

Ascent floats up, to murder memory. 

Sinister giant black’ butterflies 

Eclipse the blazing disk of sun. 



And from heaven downward dropping 

To the earth in leaden circles, 

Invisible, the monstrous swarm 

Descends upon the hearts of men, 

Sinister giant black butterflies. 



9. PRAYER TO PIERROT 



clarinet in A, piano 



Pierrot! Mein Lachen 

Hab ich verlernt! 

Das Bild des Glanzes 

ZerfloB—ZerfloB! 



Schwarz weht die Flagge 

Mir nun vom Mast. 

Pierrot! Mein Lachen 

Hab ich verlernt! 



O gieb mir wieder, 

Rofarzt der Seele, 

Schneemann der Lyrik, 

Durchlaucht vom Monde, 

Pierrot—mein Lachen! 



Pierrot! My laughter’s 

All forgot! 


The radiant image 

Dissolved — dissolved! 



Black blows the flag 

That flies at my mast. 

Pierrot! My laughter’s 

All forgot! 



O give me back — 


Soul’s Veterinarian, 


Snowman of Verse, 


Your Way-Up-Highness the Moon, 

Pierrot — my laughter! 



10. RAUB 



10. THEFT 



flute, clarinet in A, violin, cello 



Rote, fiirstliche Rubine, 


Blutge Tropfen alten Ruhmes, 

Schlummern in den Totenschreinen, 

Drunten in den Grabgewolben. 



Nachts, mit seinen Zechkumpanen, 

Steigt Pierrot hinab—zu rauben 

Rote, furstliche.Rubine, 


Blutge Tropfen alten Ruhmes. 



Doch da—strauben sich die Haare, 

Bleiche Furcht bannt sie am Platze: 

Durch die Finsternis—wie Augen!— 

Stieren aus den Totenschreinen 

Rote, fiirstliche Rubine. 



11. ROTE MESSE 



Red and princely rubies, 


Bloody drops of fabled fame, 

Slumber with dead men’s bones 

Beneath the vaults of sepulchers. 



At night, with fellow tipplers, 

Pierrot breaks in—to steal 

Red and princely rubies, 

Bloody drops of fabled fame. 



But there!—their hair’s on end— 

Livid fear turns them to stone: 

Through the dark like gleaming eyes 

Goggle from the chests of bones 

Red and princely rubies. 



11. RED MASS 



piccolo, bass clarinet in Bb, viola, cello, piano 



Zu grausem Abendmahle, 


Beim Blendeglanz des Goldes, 

Beim Flackerschein der Kerzen, 

Naht dem Altar—Pierrot! 



Die Hand, die gottgeweihte, 

ZerreiBt die Priesterkleider 

Zu grausem Abendmahle, 

Beim Blendeglanz des Goldes. 



Mit segnender Geberde 


Zeigt er den bangen Seelen 


Die triefend rote Hostie: 


Sein Herz—in blutgen Fingern— 

Zu grausem Abendmahle! 



12. GALGENLIED 



At the gruesome Eucharist, 


In the trumpery golden glare, 

In the shuddering candlelight, 

To the altar comes—Pierrot! 



His hand, by Grace anointed, 

Rips open his priestly vestment 

At the gruesome Eucharist, 


In the trumpery golden glare. 



With hand upraised in blessing 


He holds aloft to trembling souls 


The holy crimson-oozing Host: 


His ripped-out heart—in bloody fingers— 

At the gruesome Eucharist. 



12. GALLOWS DITTY 



piccolo, viola, cello 



Die diirre Dirne 

Mit langem Halse 

Wird seine letzte 

Geliebte sein. 



In seinem Hirne 

Steckt wie ein Nagel 

Die diirre Dirne 


Mit langem Halse. 



Schlank wie die Pinie, 

Am Hals ein Zopfchen— 

Wolliistig wird sie 


Den Schelm umhalsen, 

Die diirre Dirne! 



13. ENTHAUPTUNG 



The wood-dry whore 

With rope-long neck 


Will be the last lover 


To hold him tight. 



She sticks in his brain 

Like a hammered-in nail, 

The wood-dry whore 

With rope-long neck. 



Pinetree-scrawny 

With hank of hair, 

The lecher, she'll grab 

The wretch’s neck, 

The wood-dry whore! 



13. BEHEADING 



bass clarinet in Bb, viola, cello, piano 



Der Mond, ein blankes Tiirkenschwert 



Auf einem schwarzen Seidenkissen, 

Gespenstisch groB—draut er hinab 

Durch schmerzensdunkle Nacht. 



Pierrot irrt ohne Rast umher 

Und starrt empor in Todesangsten 



Zum Mond, dem blanken Tiirkenschwert 



Auf einem schwarzen Seidenkissen. 



Es schlottern unter ihm die Knie, 

Ohnmachtig bricht er jah zusammen. 

Er wahnt: es sause strafend schon 

Auf seinen Siinderhals hernieder 



Der Mond, das blanke Turkenschwert. 



The moon, a naked scimitar 


Upon a black silk cushion, 


Ghostly huge hangs threatening down 

Through night as dark as woe. 



Pierrot, who paces about in panic, 

Stares up and feels the clutch of death 

At sight of moon, a naked scimitar 

Upon a black silk cushion. 



Knees atremble, quaking, shaking, 

He falls into a faint of fright, 

Convinced it’s slashing down already 

On his guilty sinful neck, 


The moon, the naked scimitar. 



14, DIE KREUZE 



14. THE CROSSES 



flute, clarinet in A, violin, cello, piano 



Heilge Kreuze sind die Verse, 


Dran die Dichter stumm verbluten, 

Blindgeschlagen von der Geier 

Flatterndem Gespensterschwarme! 



In den Leibern schwelgten Schwerter, 

Prunkend in des Blutes Scharlach! 

Heilge Kreuze sind die Verse, 


Dran die Dichter stumm verbluten. 



Tot das Haupt—erstarrt die Locken— 

Fern, verweht der Larm des Pobels. 

Langsam sinkt die Sonne nieder, 

Eine rote Konigskrone.— 


Heilge Kreuze sind die Verse! 



PART Ill 

15. HEIMWEH 



Poems are poets’ holy crosses 

Where they, silent, bleed to death, 

Eyes struck blind by beating wings 

Of a spectral vulture swarm. 



Their ragged flesh the prey of daggers 

Reveling in their scarlet blood! 

Poems are poets’ holy crosses 


Where they, silent, bleed to death. 



Bowed and wounded sinks the head, 

Afar the silly mob still prattles. 

Slowly solemn sinks the sun, 


Gold and red of royal crown. 


Poems are poets’ holy crosses. 



15. HOMESICKNESS 



flute, clarinet in A, violin, cello, piano 



Lieblich klagend—ein krystallnes Seufzen 

Aus Italiens alter Pantomime, 


Klingts heruber: wie Pierrot so hélzern, 

So modern sentimental geworden. 



Und es tont durch seines Herzens Wiiste, 

Tont gedampft durch alle Sinne wieder, 

Lieblich klagend—ein krystallnes Seufzen 

Aus Italiens alter Pantomime. 



Da vergi$t Pierrot die Trauermienen! 

Durch den bleichen Feuerschein des Mondes, 

Durch des Lichtmeers Fluten— 


schweift die Sehnsucht 

Kiihn hinauf, empor zum Heimathimmel 

Lieblich klagend—ein krystallnes Seufzen! 



16. GEMEINHEIT! 



Gently keening, a crystalline sighing 


Voice out of Italy's old pantomime 

Complains how Pierrot’s grown so wooden, 

So trite and mawkish, inanely a la mode, 



When its voice is heard in the wilderness 

Of his heart and all his senses, 


Gently keening, a crystalline sighing 

Voice out of Italy’s old pantomime, 



Pierrot drops his churlish sulking, 

And through wan flame of moonlight, 

Through tides of light, his homesick yearning 



Soars abroad to happier skies, 

Gently keening, a crystalline sighing. 



16. VULGAR HORSEPLAY! 



piccolo, clarinet in A, violin, cello, piano 



In den blanken Kopf Cassanders, 

Dessen Schrein die Luft durchzetert, 

Bohrt Pierrot mit Heuchlermienen, 

Zartlich—einen Schadelbohrer! 



Darauf stopft er mit dem Daumen 

Seinen echten tiirkischen Taback 


In den blanken Kopf Cassanders, 

Dessen Schrein die Luft durchzetert! 



Dann dreht er ein Rohr von Weichsel 

Hinten in die glatte Glatze 


Und behabig schmaucht und pafft er 

Seinen echten tiirkischen Taback 

Aus dem blanken Kopf Cassanders! 



17. PARODIE 



Into Pantaloon’s bonebald head— 


who screams and shrieks and rends the air— 

Pierrot, that ace of hypocrites, 

Drills—tenderly!—with a surgeon’s borer. 



Then uses his thumb to pack and tamp 

His choicest blend of Turkish tobacco 

Into Pantaloon’s bonebald head— 


who screams and shrieks and rends the air. 



Ther screws a stem of cherrywood 


Into the back of the polished pate, 

Lights up and nonchalantly puffs away 

At his choicest blend of Turkish tobacco 

Through Pantaloon’s bonebald head! 



17. PARODY 



piccolo, clarinet in A, viola, piano 



Stricknadeln, blank und blinkend, 

In ihrem grauen Haar, 


Sitzt die Duenna murmetind, 


Im roten Rockchen da. 



Sie wartet in der Laube, 


Sie liebt Pierrot mit Schmerzen, 

Stricknadein, blank und blinkend, 

In ihrem grauen Haar. 



Da plotzlich—horch!—ein Wispern! 

Ein Windhauch kichert leise: 


Der Mond, der bose Spotter, 


Afft nach mit seinen Strahlen— 

Stricknadein, blink und blank. 



With knitting needles steely bright 

Stuck in her mousegray hair, 


The duenna sits there all atwitter 

In her best red party frock. 



She’s waiting ‘neath the bower, 

Ablaze for Pierrot with passion, 

With knitting needles steely bright 

Stuck in her mousegray hair. 



Suddenly—hark!—a whisper, 


The titter of a puff of wind: 


The moon, coldhearted cynic, 


Is aping with quicksilver beams 

Those knitting needles steely bright. 



18. DER MONDFLECK 



18. THE MOONFLECK 



piccolo, clarinet in Bb, violin, cello, piano 



Ejinen weiBen Fleck des hellen Mondes 

Auf dem Ricken seines schwarzen Rockes, 

So spaziert Pierrot im lauen Abend, 

Aufzusuchen Glick und Abenteuer. 



Plotzlich stort ihn was an seinem Anzug, 

Er beschaut sich rings und findet richtig— 

Einen weiBen Fleck des hellen Mondes 

Auf dem Rucken seines schwarzen Rockes. 



Warte! denkt er: das ist so ein Gipsfleck! 

Wischt und wischt, doch— 


bringt ihn nicht herunter! 

Und so geht er, giftgeschwollen, weiter, 

Reibt und reibt bis an den friihen Morgen— 

Ejinen weiBen Fleck des hellen Mondes. 



19. SERENADE 



With a fleck of white—bright patch of moonlight- 

On the back of his black jacket, 


Pierrot strolls about in the mild evening air 


On his night-time hunt for fun and good pickings. 



Suddenly something strikes him as wrong, 


He checks his clothes over and sure enough finds 

A fleck 6f white—bright patch of moonlight— 

On the back of his black jacket. 



Damn! he thinks, There’s a spot of white plaster! 

Rubs and rubs, but can't get rid of it, 



So goes on his way, his pleasure poisoned, 



Rubbing and rubbing till dawn comes up— 

At a fleck of white, a bright patch of moonlight! 



19, SERENADE 



flute, clarinet in A, violin, cello, piano 



Mit groteskem Riesenbogen 

Kratzt Pierrot auf seiner Bratsche, 

Wie der Storch auf einem Beine, 

Knipst er triib ein Pizzicato. 



Plotzlich naht Cassander—wiitend - 

Ob des nachtgen Virtuosen— 


Mit groteskem Riesenbogen 


Kratzt Pierrot auf seiner Bratsche. 



Von sich wirft er jetzt die Bratsche: 

Mit der delikaten Linken 


Fa®t den Kahikopf er am Kragen— 

Trdumend spielt er auf der Glatze 

Mit groteskem Riesenbogen. 



20. HEIMFAHRT (Barcarole) 



With grotesquely giant-sized bow 

Pierrot draws cat-squeals from his viola. 

Like a stork, on one leg balanced, 


He plucks a doleful pizzicato. 



Out pops furious Pantaloon 


Raging at the night-time virtuoso— 

With grotesquely giant-sized bow 

Pierrot draws cat-squeals from his viola. 



So the player drops his fiddle; 

Delicately, with his skilled left hand, 

Grabs old baldy by the collar— 


And dreamily plays upon his pate 

With grotesquely giant-sized bow. 



20. HOMEWARD JOURNEY (Barcarole) 



flute, clarinet in A, violin, cello, piano 



Der Mondstrahl ist das Ruder, 

Seerose dient als Boot; 


Drauf fahrt Pierrot gen Suden 

Mit gutem Reisewind. 



Der Strom summt tiefe Skalen 

Und wiegt den leichten Kahn. 


Der Mondstrahl ist das Ruder, 

Seerose dient als Boot. 



Nach Bergamo, zur Heimat, 


Kehrt nun Pierrot zuriick; 

Schwach dammert schon im Osten 

Der griine Horizont. 


—Der Mondstrahl ist das Ruder. 



21. O ALTER DUFT 



With moonbeam as his rudder, 

His boat a water lily, 


Pierrot sails softly southward 

Driven onward by the wind. 



The river hums its watery scales 

And gently rocks his skiff, 

With moonbeam as his rudder, 

His boat a water lily. 



To Bergamo, his native land, 

Pierrot is homeward bound. 

Pale dawns already in the east 

The green of morning's rim 

—With moonbeam as his rudder. 



21. O SCENT OF FABLED YESTERYEAR 



flute, piccolo, clarinet in A, bass clarinet in Bb, violin, viola, cello, piano 



O alter Duft aus Marchenzeit, 

Berauschest wieder meine Sinne; 

Ein narrisch Heer von Schelmerein 

Durchschwirrt die leichte Luft. 



Ein gliickhaft Wiinschen macht mich froh 

Nach Freuden, die ich lang verachtet: 


O alter Duft aus Marchenzeit, 

Berauschest wieder mich! 



All meinen Unmut gab ich preis; 


Aus meinem sonnumrahmten Fenster 

Beschau ich frei die liebe Welt 


Und traum hinaus in selge Weiten.. . 

O alter Duft—aus Marchenzeit! 



O scent of fabled yesteryear, 

Befuddling my senses with bygone joys! 

Asilly swarm of idle fancies 


Murmurs through the gentle air. 



A happy ending so long yearned for. 

Recalls old pleasures long disdained: 

O scent of fabled yesteryear, 

Befuddling me again! 



My bitter mood has turned to peace; 

My sundrenched window opens wide 

On daytime thoughts of world | love, 

To daydreams of a world beyond. . . 


O scent of fabled yesteryear! 



translation by ROBERT ERICH WOLF 




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