Book Review

Anton Von Webern
by Malcolm Hayes

This brief biography of my favorite Second Viennese School composer, Webern, was informative and well-written. Mercifully, it is also much shorter than the exhaustive Moldenhauer biography. Hayes does a great job of not only conveying the facts of Webern's life, but also exploring his relationship with Schoenberg, and several facets of his psyche. I also appreciated the fact that Hayes did not shy away from or seek to hide Webern's less than admirable admiration for the Third Reich. I very much admire Webern;s music and this was a good introduction to his life.