Between Oberrad and Amorbach 39He also took private lessons from both men. The string quartet he
composed during his training was performed by the Lange Quartet in
- This was by no means unusual, for in the 1920s Frankfurt had the
facilities to provide an outstanding forum for new music. One of its
most active advocates was the young Hermann Scherchen, who directed
the museum concerts and was responsible for the ‘New-Music Week’.
The beginning of his friendship with Adorno dates back to those years.
Did Adorno even notice that, from the summer of 1922 on, inflation
had begun to transform urban life in Frankfurt? According to Rolf
Hilbrunn, with whom Adorno was friendly at the time, people were
overcome by a boundless search for pleasure:
Dance halls (known as ‘Dielen’) sprang up everywhere, decorated
with the outlandish colours and confusing curves that were typical
of amateurish attempts at expressionism. Nightclubs competed with
each other to put on the most risqué shows. Gambling clubs opened
up everywhere in the wealthier suburbs where the impoverish-
ment of the middle classes had started, and many a worthy pen-
sioner eagerly seized the opportunity of improving his financial
position by renting out some of his seven-room apartment by the
evening. The purchasing power of the Mark fell from week to
week, and then from day to day, and even from hour to hour.^50Although no end was in sight to the collapse of the currency, the
eighteen-year-old youth whom Leo Löwenthal describes as ‘the pam-
pered young gentleman from a well-to-do family’ could embark on a
journey to the south, to the South Tyrol and the Dolomites. It appears
that he could afford a style of life that set him apart from the general
poverty and misery of the inflation years. His father’s business was
unaffected by the all-too-common closures and bankruptcies, evidence
that the cautious Wiesengrund had invested part of his fortune in mater-
ial assets. As an only son, Adorno was the main beneficiary of the
relative prosperity of the family which survived through the precarious
postwar years. He could not only finance the trip to Italy, but could also
take every opportunity to retreat with his family or with friends to
Amorbach, where he spent his time reading or talking.
There was no lack of topics for such discussions. Chief among these
were events from the cultural life of Frankfurt, such as lectures at
the university, authors’ readings, a concert in the Saalbau or a stage
performance at one of the five city theatres. A visit to one of the last
was the occasion of a clever article about expressionist drama, written
while Adorno was still in his last year at school. This article, entitled
‘Expressionism and Artistic Truthfulness’, was published in Die neue
Schaubühne in 1920. It was one of the first articles of his career as a
writer and contained his critique of the expressionist currents of the
day. It expressed his distrust of the exaggerations of the self that thinks