Who can guess the identity of my new avatar?

[nordin dk 0]

He who does, shall recieve 1$ in cash and prices, and the honor of being one clever son-of-a-gun.

Here's a clue: he was accidently shot to death in the last days of WWII.

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

I had a hard time searching! As you know many famous people were accidently shot. I am usually good with that stuff but unfortunately did our historybooks rarely had any pictures!

[Guest]

Do you have a more complete picture. Can you give us some other clue?

[Wreck-It 0]

hmmm. the guy that directed the manhatan project??? Can't remeber his name...

[KingBeast 0]

That would be Anton Webern, austrian composer no?

Shot by Russian soldiers accidentally.

[Guest]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Wreck-It @ April 25 2002,02:20)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">hmmm.  the guy that directed the manhatan project??? Can't remeber his name...<span id='postcolor'>

Oppenheimer? Nah, it's not him. He lived longer.

This is him btw:

[KingBeast 0]

Is it an intentional clue that the picture is hosted on a website that has musical ties? Anyway where is my money?

[Guest]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (KingBeast @ April 25 2002,02:37)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">That would be Anton Webern, austrian composer no?

Shot by Russian soldiers accidentally.<span id='postcolor'>

Oh man, you're good! Sure it's Webern, I see it now. Would have never thought of it!

[Guest]

... but he was shot by an american soldier according to my "History of Western Music" by Donald Grout.

and nordin: he was shot after the end of the war: 15 september 1945

[KingBeast 0]

hmm really? Im going to check, i could have sworn it was done by ruskies!

[Guest]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (KingBeast @ April 25 2002,02:49)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">hmm really? Im going to check, i could have sworn it was done by ruskies!<span id='postcolor'>

That's what the books says. Besides, there were no Russians in Vienna

[KingBeast 0]

Hmm well i just did a qucik search and verily, everything points to him being shot by an American Military Policeman. But i searched for anton webern and russian and look what i found!

Sunday January 28: Could there be such a thing as a conspiracy to murder classical music composers? That remote possibility in entertained in a most dramatic way in Rosa: The Death of a Composer (1994), the fruit of a collaboration between classical music composer Louis Andriessen and filmmaker Peter Greenaway, known to the public from Prospero’s Books and The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover. The conspiracy assumes Austrian composer Anton Webern was the first victim. (In truth, Webern was accidentally shot to death by Russian troops of occupation in post-WWII Austria.)

[Guest]

As, I said, there were no Russians in Austria.

This is from Grout:

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Webern began his studies with Schoenberg at the same time he was completing his studies in musicology (1904–1908). He also conducted various regional orchestras, and from 1922 to 1934 he conducted the Vienna Workers' Symphony. Hitler's rise to power in the Thirties and the eventual forceful annexation of Austria brought great personal hardship to the composer. In 1933 his mentor, Schoenberg, emigrated to America. Webern's modernist music was banned, and his works burned. He had to work as a proofreader in Vienna to avoid forced labor for the Nazis. He died soon after the war's end, mistakenly shot by an American soldier while smoking a cigar on the porch of his home.<span id='postcolor'>

[USSoldier11B 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">... but he was shot by an american soldier according to my "History of Western Music" by Donald Grout.

<span id='postcolor'>

Communist propaganda!

[KingBeast 0]

Ah well American soldier it is. They seem to have a distinct problem with friendly fire...

*leaps into a cocnrete reinforced bunker and donsa flame proof suit*

[Guest]

Ussoldier:

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">

Communist propaganda!

<span id='postcolor'>

+

KingBeast:

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">

Ah well American soldier it is. They seem to have a distinct problem with friendly fire...

<span id='postcolor'>

= me off to bed letting you battle it out

ps. Invite wobble to the discussion

[nordin dk 0]

Anton Webern is the correct answer, KingBeast is the winner, and that was quicker than I had expected. Well done!

KingBeast, there's a dollar worth of toiletpaper waiting for you in my local supermarket. I left it in your name, you can pick it up any time

FYI Webern is one of my favorite composers.

He was a pupil of Arnold Schönberg, the inventor of socalled 12-tone, or dodecaphonic, music. Schönberg had another famous pupil, Alban Berg, whose violinconcerto is probably the only widely popular 12-tone piece. These three composers are generally referred to as the 2.Viennese School (the 1. Viennese school consisting of Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven).

Webern can be considered of tremendous importance to contemporary classical music, not the least because most of the composers living and working today list him as a major influence. He developed the 12-tone technique into more elaborate serialism, (music composed by using predetermined series of notes, much like a sequence of numbers), but most importantly, he managed to do what his teacher Schönberg could not (in my opinion) -  make musical sense of the 12-tone technique.

That was todays music lesson, want more?

Favorite pieces: Passacaglia opus 1, 6 pieces opus 6, Chamber Concerto.

To denoir...Grout: best overall music history book ever. Congrats on owning a copy

[Guest]

I can just imagine how he got killed: Webern is sitting on his porch, smoking a cigar and scribbeling down some music. PFC Cletus Wombat from Alabama approaches him:

CW: What' you writng there boy?

AW: Some music. Go away.

CW: Music? Can you play the ukulele?

AW: No, I am sketching on some 12-tone counterpoint for a string quartet.

CW: ........ BLAM!, BLAM!, BLAM!

[sergeant comes running]

SGT: What happened Cletus? Why did you shoot that man?

CW:He didn't play the ukulele. I think he was one of them German boys.

SGT: [groan] How many times do I have to tell you Cletus, the war is over and we don't kill Germans any more!

nordin: Grout is good but has some interpretations of his own that aren't widely accepted (especially for the post romantic era). Oh, and by the way, just so that you should know, Webern is not the best composer... Bach is

[nordin dk 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Webern is not the best composer... Bach is <span id='postcolor'>

Troll!

Haha, never thought I would consider discussing composers on thís Forum. What has the world come to.

There is not one composer above all others. You cannot compare Bach and Webern. They have some things in common, like a perfectly honed counterpoint skill, but their music is so different. I like both, as much as I do Schubert, Beethoven, Mozart, Ravel etc. etc.

The tragedy of Webern's death ranges up there with the all to premature deaths of Mozart(35), Schubert(31), Mendelssohn(38) Schumann(46) Gerschwin (39) and Hugo Wolf (43), probably the lesser known of this bunch...

-

I read somewhere that the soldier who shot him, ended up in a mental institute when it dawned on him who he had killed. Probably false, but a nice story

[Damage Inc 0]

It must be some kind of magic.

[nordin dk 0]

What is?

[Damage Inc 0]

Shhh, if you don't know then don't say anything.

The people are closing in on us. They want to stop us.

[Guest]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (nordin dk @ April 25 2002,15:06)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Webern is not the best composer... Bach is <span id='postcolor'>

Troll!

Haha, never thought I would consider discussing composers on thís Forum. What has the world come to.<span id='postcolor'>

Me neither I have some interest in the subject ( I studied composition at the conservatoire here in Stockholm as a hobby thing parallel to my real Electrical Engineering studies - and I never finished it, but it was fun anyway).

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">

There is not one composer above all others. You cannot compare Bach and Webern.

<span id='postcolor'>

Just watch me

No, but on the serious side, Bach has always been my favourite.

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">They have some things in common, like a perfectly honed counterpoint skill, but their music is so different. I like both, as much as I do Schubert, Beethoven, Mozart, Ravel etc. etc. <span id='postcolor'>

Well, besides of the fact that taste is different I think that you can compare composers. Wouldn't you say that Weberns music is better then Britney's music?

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">The tragedy of Webern's death ranges up there with the all to premature deaths of Mozart(35), Schubert(31), Mendelssohn(38) Schumann(46) Gerschwin (39) and Hugo Wolf (43), probably the lesser known of this bunch...

<span id='postcolor'>

Wolf's life was perhaps the most tragic one, he did his composing during very short periods of sanity. He did some great Lieders during that short time. He was really a talent, pity he went mad

[Albert Schweitzer 10]

My favourite was/is Chopin and my favourite classical musician is Sabine Mayer....therefore of course my favourite instrument is clarinette (the best is Weber's clarinette concert is Nr.1. op 73, op 26 and op 74) but of course everyone knows and likes it, nothing special!

[Wreck-It 0]

You guys are way off in bad taste. Vivaldi's four seasons is the most charming piece of music. And Verdi's La Traviata has got to be the most recognizable even for the neophyte.