Portrait of Berg painted by Arnold Schoenberg, 1910. Alban Maria Johannes Berg (February 9, 1885 - December 24, 1935) was an Austrian composer. He was more interested in literature than music as a child and did not begin to compose until he was 15, when h
Portrait of Berg painted by Arnold Schoenberg, 1910. Alban Maria Johannes Berg (February 9, 1885 - December 24, 1935) was an Austrian composer. He was more interested in literature than music as a child and did not begin to compose until he was 15, when he started to teach himself music. Berg had little formal music education before he became a student of Arnold Schoenberg in October 1904. With Schoenberg he studied counterpoint, music theory, and harmony. By 1906, he was studying music full-time; by 1907, he began composition lessons. Berg studied with Schoenberg for six years until 1911. Berg admired him as a composer and mentor, and they remained close lifelong friends. He was a part of Vienna's cultural elite during the heady fin de siècle period. His circle included the musicians Alexander von Zemlinsky and Franz Schreker, the painter Gustav Klimt, the writer and satirist Karl Kraus, the architect Adolf Loos, and the poet Peter Altenberg. From 1915 to 1918, Berg served in the Austro-Hungarian Army. After WWI he settled in Vienna where he taught private pupils. He also helped Schoenberg run his Society for Private Musical Performances, which sought to create the ideal environment for the exploration and appreciation of unfamiliar new music by means of open rehearsals, repeat performances, and the exclusion of professional critics. As a composer he produced compositions that combined Mahlerian Romanticism with a personal adaptation of Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique. He died on Christmas Eve 1935, from blood poisoning apparently caused by an insect-sting-induced carbuncle on his back. He was 50 years old. No photographer credited, undated.
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