_%25C2%25A9_Max_Fenichel_(1885%25E2%2580%25931942)_OeNB_20062639.png)
TheSkandalkonzert ("scandal concert") was a concert conducted byArnold Schoenberg, held on 31 March 1913. The concert was held by the Vienna Concert Society in the Great Hall of theMusikverein inVienna. The concert consisted of music by composers of theSecond Viennese School.
During the concert, the audience, shocked by theexpressionism andexperimentalism of the music, began rioting, and the concert ended prematurely. Amid the unrest, concert organizer Erhard Buschbeck was said to have slapped a concertgoer in the face; this would eventually lead to a lawsuit against Buschbeck. The event also led to an alternate name for theSkandalkonzert:Watschenkonzert, from theAustrian German for "slap concert". Operetta composerOscar Straus, a witness to the alleged assault, testified that the slap had been "the most harmonious sound of the evening."
The programme listed:
During Berg's songs the audience called for both the poet and composer to be committed, despite it being public knowledge thatAltenberg was already committed to an asylum at the time.[1] Though not present at the concert, he was granted leave to attend the dress-rehearsal that morning, and three days later he wrote a prose sketch depictingAlma Mahler there.[2] At the concert it was during Berg's songs that the fighting began. At the trial, Straus commented that the thud of Buschbeck's punch had been the most harmonious sound at the entire concert.[1] For Berg's work theSkandalkonzert had lasting consequences: the songs were not performed again until 1952, and the full score did not appear in print until 1966.[3]
The first performance of Schoenberg'sGurrelieder was held on 23 February 1913, in the Great Hall of the Musikverein, under the direction ofFranz Schreker, and was an overwhelming success. But the composer, offended by the previous conservative attitude of the Viennese public, refused to accept the applause. In return, the audience took revenge a few weeks later in the next concert of contemporary works there.[4] Press reports from the period mention tumultuous riots: Schoenberg's followers and a student of his and opponents yelling at each other, throwing things, disturbing the performance, destroying furniture, etc.
The famousfracas at the premiere ofIgor Stravinsky'sThe Rite of Spring took place in Paris two months later, on 29 May 1913.[5]