Can composing ever truly be taught? The story of one of Arnold Schoenberg’s most gifted pupils indicates that, in some respects, it can. Alban Berg was born in Vienna in 1885 into a prosperous family, which from early on had decided to propel him into a respectable bourgeois career. Young Alban had quite other ideas, however, immersing himself in the more radical areas of the city’s burgeoning artistic and musical scene. He was also composing voice-and-piano songs, which, while showing no great individuality as yet, were accomplished for a self-taught young composer. Then in 1904, the hard-up Schoenberg advertised his services as a freelance composition teacher at a local school, and was impressed enough by Berg’s early Lieder to take him on as pupil.
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