Musicologists have long loved the fact that Alban Berg set the Theodor Storm love poem Schliesse mir die Augen beide (Close both my eyes) twice—once in his early student days, and once nearly 20 years later as a first plunge into the emerging world of twelve-tone composition. It is always fascinating to observe a composer retrace his own steps. The 1925 Schliesse mir die Augen beide is not a revision or a rewrite of the 1907 - 1909 Schliesse mir die Augen beide; it is in fact a completely separate song that just happens to employ the same text. But, because the songs are settings of the same text, they allow us to observe Berg move from suave Romanticism to pattern-based serialism all the more clearly. Berg, too, seems to have recognized the interest generated by two songs on the same text: in autumn 1925 he bundled them together and sent them over to Universal Edition publishers.

The date of Schliesse mir die Augen beide I has been the subject of some debate. 1907 or 1909 are currently the most widely acknowledged possibilities, but the year 1900—which is astonishingly early, and would place it before even the earliest Jugendlieder—was once assigned to it. 1900 hardly seems likely, given the music's self-assuredness. The earliest of the Jugendlieder are hopelessly clumsy, whereas Schliesse mir die Augen beide I is balanced and well-mannered—it sounds much more like the Seven Early Songs of 1905 - 1908. The date of Schliesse mir die Augen beide II, 1925, seems beyond question.

Neither song is very long. Schliesse mir die Augen beide I lasts just nine measures; Schliesse mir die Augen beide II, 20 (the difference is not as large as it would at first seem: the earlier setting is in 5/4, the later one in 3/4—making it 45 beats and 60 beats per song). The earlier setting is like honey, with a gooey melody in constant eighth notes and thick, lightly chromatic harmonies in C major. Everything is quiet—piano or pianissimo.

Schliesse mir die Augen beide II is a very different beast. The melody jumps and skips around in short bursts, and the accompaniment is a conjunct of many different rhythmic layers (not heard simultaneously, but always shifting from one to another). C major is right out, of course, as is any other key in the traditional sense—this is atonal music, though as with so much Berg music, tonal gestures peek through the cracks almost constantly. The tone-row used in the song is the same one used in the Lyric Suite of 1925 - 1926: the famous and oft-used (perhaps too oft-used) "all-interval" tone-row. There is inevitably something hyper-intellectual about twelve-tone music, but that does not meant that a composer's identity is lost in the pattern-making: Berg remained at heart a romanticist until his dying day, and, in its way, Schliesse mir die Augen beide II is every bit as warm and lush than Schliesse mir die Augen beide I.

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