These pieces are among Webern's best known instrumental miniatures. Their extreme brevity is remarkable: Webern's melodic cells are reduced to groups of two or three notes, and phrases are strikingly concise. The overall effect is one of meticulous craftsmanship. These pieces are also important precursors to the twelve-tone method of composition: although Webern's teacher and mentor Arnold Schoenberg would not "officially" invent this method until 1921, in the Op. 11 pieces Webern is already using—albeit unsystematically—complete statements of the 12 notes of the chromatic scale as musical ideas.

Many years after these pieces were completed, Webern still viewed them with fondness, and thought that they were good; however, he also regarded them as too experimental and felt that they should not be played. He was afraid that they were too difficult to understand and would be misunderstood by audiences, even decades after their first appearance.

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