Arnold Schoenberg, a Viennese composer born on September 13th, 1874, would become one of the most important influences on classical contemporary music. Born to a non musical family, Schoenberg was a primarily self-taught cellist and joined an amateur orchestra under the direction of Alexander Zemlinsky. He would later be instructed in composition by Zemlinsky, and in counterpoint by Oskar Adler. Schoenberg became prolific in music theory and composition while working his job as a bank clerk, and later quit this job to become a full time musician. The composer got his start as a musician by arranging operettas, teaching, and composing. Due to moving around to many different places and teaching positions, Schoenberg became familiar with the many
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It is essentially a chart that organizes the tone row created and allows for the calculation of four variations on the original tone row. The four forms consist of the Prime Row (the original row discussed above), the Retrograde of the Prime Row (The prime row spelled backwards), the Inversion of the Prime Row(The prime row where intervals have been inverted to where a rising 3rd would become a falling 3rd, etc), and the Retrograde of the Inversion of the Prime Row(The backwards spelling of the inverted row). These four forms of the original tone row from Moses und Aron(C♯, D, G♯, F♯, G, F, B, A, B♭, C, E♭, E), can be seen below in the two 12-tone matrices, one using note names and the other using numbers. They both tell a composer the same thing, just in different forms. The left horizontal rows are the prime forms starting on various scale degree numbers (row P0 is the original row, P11 is the original intervals of the P0 row, but starting on the 11th note of this tone row, or the note C.) The horizontal rows starting from the right is the same as the prime form of the same row, but retrograde or backwards. The vertical row starting from the top is the inversion of the prime row, with the original prime row inversion being I0 (Instead of moving from C♯ up a half step to D, in the inversion, you would move down a half step or semitone to C♮.) The vertical row from the bottom is the retrograde, or backwards form of the
It is essentially a chart that organizes the tone row created and allows for the calculation of four variations on the original tone row. The four forms consist of the Prime Row (the original row discussed above), the Retrograde of the Prime Row (The prime row spelled backwards), the Inversion of the Prime Row(The prime row where intervals have been inverted to where a rising 3rd would become a falling 3rd, etc), and the Retrograde of the Inversion of the Prime Row(The backwards spelling of the inverted row). These four forms of the original tone row from Moses und Aron(C♯, D, G♯, F♯, G, F, B, A, B♭, C, E♭, E), can be seen below in the two 12-tone matrices, one using note names and the other using numbers. They both tell a composer the same thing, just in different forms. The left horizontal rows are the prime forms starting on various scale degree numbers (row P0 is the original row, P11 is the original intervals of the P0 row, but starting on the 11th note of this tone row, or the note C.) The horizontal rows starting from the right is the same as the prime form of the same row, but retrograde or backwards. The vertical row starting from the top is the inversion of the prime row, with the original prime row inversion being I0 (Instead of moving from C♯ up a half step to D, in the inversion, you would move down a half step or semitone to C♮.) The vertical row from the bottom is the retrograde, or backwards form of the