DURATION: ca. 5 Min.
PUBLISHER: Belmont Music Publishers
Dreimal tausend Jahre," op. 50A, sets a short lyric poem from the "Jordan Lieder" by Dagobert Runes. The second of the series Opus 50 uses the original Hebrew of Psalm 130, the "De Profundis"; while the third is bases on Schönberg's own text, the first of sixteen short "psalms" written during the last ten months of his life.
The setting of Opus 50B, "De Profundis," finished in July, 1950 and dedicated to the State of Israel, owes its origin to a request by Chemjo Vinaver, a choral conductor who was compiling an anthology for the Jewish Agency for Palestine. Schönberg seems to have purposely written a piece that was easily singable, and in fact asked Vinaver in May 1951: "Should you have already performed it, I would like to know how it came out, that is, how the dramatic character appeared which is produced through the alternation of speaking and singing voices. I want also to know whether as a chorus director, you see great difficulties to perform the piece." Most often the six-part texture is characterized by voices being rhythmically paired against each other, though there is great variety in the nature of these pairings. The opening words, for example, are spoken in unison by men's voices, while the first hexachord is divided polyphonically between the second soprano and alto. The climax, teached on the final word of the last sentence, "He shall redeem His Israel," takes the first soprano up to b," and beneath the seven beats that this note is sustained, the lower five voices are rhythmically joined and, chantlike, speak the sentence again. The chorus then concludes with a tutti repetition of the line; the women's voices lead the men's voices, though complimentary rhythms bind the two groups.
© Arnold Schönberg Center