Vast Trove of Arnold Schoenberg’s Music Is Destroyed in Fire

An estimated 100,000 scores and parts by the groundbreaking 20th-century composer Arnold Schoenberg were destroyed last week when the wildfires in Southern California burned down the music publishing company founded by his heirs. The company rents and sells the scores to ensembles around the world.

“It’s brutal,” said Larry Schoenberg, 83, a son of the composer, who ran the company, Belmont Music Publishers, from his home in the Pacific Palisades neighborhood of Los Angeles and kept the firm’s inventory in a 2,000-square-foot building behind his house. “We lost everything.”

Belmont’s catalog offered a wide range of Schoenberg’s music, from the lush, hyper-Romantic pieces of his youth to the challenging works he wrote after breaking from conventional tonal harmony and developing his 12-tone technique.

No original Schoenberg manuscripts were destroyed in the fire. But the loss of Belmont’s collection could create problems for orchestras, chamber music groups and soloists planning performances of Schoenberg’s works in the months ahead. Other Schoenberg memorabilia was also destroyed in the fire, including photographs, letters, posters, books and arrangements by other composers of Schoenberg pieces.

Leon Botstein, the president of Bard College and the music director of the American Symphony Orchestra, said that Belmont played an essential role in making Schoenberg’s music available to the public. The American Symphony Orchestra got its scores for a performance of Schoenberg’s oratorio “Gurrelieder,” which it performed last year at Carnegie Hall, from Belmont.

“It’s a catastrophe,” Mr. Botstein said. “It was an indispensable resource.”

He added that some ensembles could be forced to make changes to their upcoming programs because the scores they need will not be available from Belmont.