1979, I played on the Orpheus tour which began for me in India and moved on to concerts in Vienna, Salzburg, Amsterdam and Utrecht. On my day off in Vienna, I made a trip to the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek where there was an extraordinary archive of musical materials. Many of materials were stored in card catalogs and the contents were openly available to visitors. I randomly selected the entries under “Sch” marked by a card with “Sch” written very neatly in blue ink. The first thing I picked from the file was rather extraordinary! It was a letter (octavo size-not big) written by Arnold Schoenberg in 1910 to a group of wealthy patrons associated with the Musikverein concert hall. It was in script and that was impossible for me to decipher! Luckily, there was a typed up transliteration in the folder. It was in German. The contents of the letter shocked me. In this letter, Schoenberg mentioned that his financial situation was poor. He had a novel suggestion, though. He wrote that he would be available to make an oil portrait of any member of the Musikverein group. He stated his fee and the number of sittings required to do this. I put the letter back in its folder. It seemed to me so sad that a man who had already composed the famous “Verklaerte Nacht” was having to “hustle” like this for money! Recently, I wondered if there was a pdf of the letter I saw online. I did not find it, unfortunately, but found a letter with similar content. It was written to Emil Hertzka, Schoenberg’s publisher also in 1910.
The letter was posted on: archiv@schoenberg.at
“Dear Director Herzka ,
due to Schreker's interruption, I was unable to discuss one more matter with you. I would like to ask you to perhaps give me some work (revision, piano reduction, or the like) for Universal Edition as I am obliged to supplement my income somehow . You know I have few hours this year. My income has decreased, my expenses have increased. I must do something. It seems I won't be getting anything from the publisher very soon. Above all, I urgently need money now.
I think you will surely be able to find some work for me (perhaps orchestration ?
But I wanted to tell you something else. You know that I paint. But you don't know that my work is highly praised by experts. I'm also scheduled to exhibit next year . And I think perhaps you could persuade well-known patrons to buy paintings from me, or to commission me to paint their portraits. I would be happy to paint you as a sample. I would like to paint you free of charge if you assure me that you will then secure commissions for me. However, you mustn't tell people that they will like my paintings . Instead, you must make them understand that they must like my paintings because they have been praised by experts in the field.
And I think perhaps you could persuade well-known patrons to buy paintings from me, or to commission me to paint their portraits. I would be happy to paint you as a sample. I would like to paint you free of charge if you assure me that you will then secure commissions for me. However, you mustn't tell people that they will like my paintings . Instead, you must make them understand that they must like my paintings because they have been praised by experts in the field. above all, it is surely far more interesting to be painted or own a painting by a musician of my renown than by some craftsman whose name no one will remember in 20 years, while mine is already part of music history. I charge for a portrait Life-size, 2 to 6 sessions and 200 to 400 crowns. That's very cheap, isn't it? Considering that these pictures will fetch ten times the price in 20 years and a hundred times the price in 40 years, you're probably aware of this yourself, and I hope you won't make any bad jokes about such a serious matter, but rather take it as seriously as it is.
So, as I said, I am ready to paint your portrait
I'd be happy to paint a sample picture free of charge if you assure me that I'll receive commissions as a result . However, I will not agree to a situation where the purchase of a painting depends on whether the client likes it. The client knows who paints; they must also understand that they have no artistic skill, but that the painting has artistic value or at least historical value. I would be very grateful if you would help me in this regard, and I believe you would not only be doing me a great service if you thought about it not in a Viennese way , but generously: in a cosmopolitan way . Please order the Gurre music paper immediately. Despite my remark, which you maliciously interpreted as a "dangerous threat," I have already begun preliminary work..
Best regards, Arnold Schönberg
As I wrote, the letter I happened upon in Vienna 46 years ago was a different letter but it touched uponm the same content!
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