Leopold Spinner (26 April 1906 - 12 August 1980), Ukrainian-born, British-domiciled composer and editor, was a pupil of Anton Webern and may be regarded as a representative of the so-called Second Viennese School. Almost all Spinner’s music was written according to the twelve-tone technique. His early works, up to and including the Zwei kleine Stücke, are clearly influenced by Berg and middle-period Schoenberg. From the mid-1930s the general idiom
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Leopold Spinner (26 April 1906 - 12 August 1980), Ukrainian-born, British-domiciled composer and editor, was a pupil of Anton Webern and may be regarded as a representative of the so-called Second Viennese School. Almost all Spinner’s music was written according to the twelve-tone technique. His early works, up to and including the Zwei kleine Stücke, are clearly influenced by Berg and middle-period Schoenberg. From the mid-1930s the general idiom, expressive intensity, dramatic economy and impeccable craftsmanship bear witness to his admiration for his teacher Webern – and, through Webern, for the whole Austro-German tradition from Bach onwards. Spinner himself carried that tradition a stage further. While retaining the purity and thematically essentialized textures of Webern, his works show a concern for larger and bolder gestures than Webern’s norm. In his later music, beginning with the perhaps ironically named Sonatina for piano, the expressive pressure applied to strict motivic working results in a wholly individual style of almost explosive force. See: Leopold Spinner by Regina Busch, Musik der Zeit 6, 1987
