Dreimal sieben Gedichte aus Albert Girauds Pierrot Lunaire (Deutsch von Erich Otto Hartleben). Für eine Sprechstimme Klavier, Flöte (auch Piccolo), Klarinette (auch Baß=Klarinette), Geige (auch Bratsche) und Violoncell. (Melodramen) ... Op. 21 Partitur. Numerierte orzugsausgabe auf Bütten. [Full score for voice and chamber orchestra]

Wien ... Leipzig: Universal=Edition [PN U.E. 5334. 5336.], 1914. Folio. Original publisher's textured ivory wrappers with titling gilt to upper. 1f. (recto blank, verso with "No. 22" and Schoenberg's autograph signature), 1f. (recto title, verso blank), [i] ("Vorwort" by Schoenberg), [i] (contents), [ii] (text of the 21 poems), 5-78, [ii] (blank) pp. Music engraved. With printed note to lower left corner of first page of music ("Copyright 1914 by Universal-Edition") and printed note to lower right corner of first page of music ("Stich und Druck von Breitkopf & Härtel in Leipzig"). Printed on fine handmade paper with a crown watermark. Housed in an attractive dark brown calf-backed dark ivory linen archival folding case with raised bands and titling gilt to spine.

Signed by Schoenberg and with printed number "22" to verso of first leaf.

Edges very slightly worn and browned. In exceptionally good condition overall. First Edition, first (deluxe) issue, limited to 50 signed and numbered copies, this no. 22. Rare. Rufer (Engl.) pp. 38-40. Ringer p. 314. Tetsuo Satoh pp. 13-16. Crawford p. 441.

The first issue of the edition, shipped on July 30, 1914, was split: 50 copies were printed on high-quality laid paper, the remaining 200 copies were printed on regular paper. The copies on laid paper carry the printed note "Numerierte Vorzugsausgabe auf Bütten" to title, as in the present copy. Hitherto unrecorded is the fact that all copies of this issue bear the note "Stich und Druck von Breitkopf & Härtel in Leipzig" to the lower right corner of the first page of music. The note "Weag" [Waldheim-Eberle A.G.] to p. 78, mentioned in the Schoenberg Complete Edition (Abteilung VI, Reihe B, Band 24, 1, critical report by Reinhold Brinkmann), is found only in the second issue of 1923.

Pierrot Lunaire, Schoenberg's setting of 21 selected poems from Belgian writer Albert Giraud's eponymous cycle, was first performed at the Berlin Choralion-Saal on 16 October 1912 with soprano Albertine Zehme as vocalist. "Schoenberg, who was fascinated by numerology, ... makes great use of seven-note motifs throughout the work, while the ensemble (with conductor) comprises seven people. The piece is his opus 21, contains 21 poems, and was begun on March 12, 1912. Other key numbers in the work are 3 and 13: each poem consists of 13 lines (two four-line verses followed by a five-line verse), while the first line of each poem occurs three times (being repeated as lines 7 and 13)." Wikipedia

"Pierrot Lunaire is one of the most representative works of the twentieth century, as much as Pablo Picasso's Man with the Guitar or James Joyce's Ulysses. As a creative effort in a single consistent style, as an artistic phenomenon, it stands alone among Schoenberg's compositions. The era of 1912, the sunset of a long epoch of peaceful construction in Central Europe, found an unmistakable expression interest in it." Stuckenschmidt pp. 71-2.

"This melodrama is numbered among the unique, unrepeatable creative works which, both positively and negatively, point the way for, and mark the destiny of, the art of music. Seen in this lofty historical perspective, it takes its place in the line of works such as Mozart's Don Giovanni, Beethoven's Missa Solemnis or late quartets, Wagner's Tristan, Mahler's Song of the Earth, and Richard Strauss's Elektra. This is not a matter of drawing comparisons; when I place Pierrot Lunaire alongside the works just mentioned, it is only to point out that, like them, it was, in a sense, created at as crucial moment for music." Reich p. 79.