When Webern wrote these pieces in 1909 he was in his mid-twenties; he had a university degree {Doctor of Philosophy) under his belt, was equally possessed by music and innocent, had acquired in Schoenberg's school the moral and technical equipment of a highly developed art of composition, and was scraping out a living as an assistant operetta conductor. His guiding examples, apart from Schoenberg, were Mahler and Wagner and, probably without his being conscious then of their proximity, the erudi...