He founded the Second Viennese School - a group of composers (including Berg and Webern who were
taught by Schoenberg in Vienna) who wrote Expressionist music.
Peripetie is from the 'Five Orchestral Pieces' and was written in 1922 (the early twentieth century).
It is the fourth of Schoenberg's Five Orchestral Pieces.
Peripetie means 'A sudden reversal'.
It was completed in 1909. The first performance took place in London in 1912 .
Texture and Dynamics
Largely contrapuntal, occasional monophonic and homophonic moments.
Textures built up by using imitation, diminution and inversion.
The final climax of the piece is created from three different canons that are heard at the same time.
There are frequent sudden changes of dynamics, leading to extreme contrasts between ppp and fff.
Instrumentation
Requires a large, full orchestra.
Strings, woodwind, brass and percussion.
Changes rapidly throughout, creating many contrasts in timbre.
Instruments are played to the extreme of their range either very low or very high.
Cymbals are played, unusually, with a mallet.
Rhythm, Metre and Tempo
Metre changes between 3/4, 2/4 and 4/4.
Tempo is sehr rasch - very quick.
Rhythms are complex, and varied, and change quickly in parts of the work.
A number of different rhythmic patterns on top of each other to create complex contrapuntal textures.
Tonality and Harmony
Atonal - has no key or mode.
Dissonant harmony chords and melodies, often built in hexachords (set of six notes).
Melody
Made up of short, fragmented motifs.
Octave displacement is used - unexpectedly moving individual notes of the main melody into a
different octave.
Motifs are varied through the use of inversion and rhythmic augmentation.
Rhythmic augmentation - the notes become twice as long.
Inversion - melody is turned upside down.
Structure
The piece is free rondo form, with five sections A B A C A.
The piece is called free rondo because it is very different to the traditional type of rondo heard in
the Classical period, when different sections were clearly contrasted.