When she heard that Liszt and Richard Wagner would be participating in a Beethoven centenary festival in Vienna in 1870, she refused to attend.[11]. She travelled along with Joachim and some other musicians to Edinburgh and Glasgow, Scotland, in early 1867. Her father Friedrich Wieck was a piano teacher and music dealer and her mother Marianne was a concert pianist who continued with her own career even during a period in which she had five children in seven years. Marie also dissuaded her mother from continuing to burn letters that she had received from Brahms which he had asked her to destroy. The monument in Bonn, Germany, where Robert Schumann and Clara Wieck Schumann are buried depicts their contribution to music, her role as his muse, and honors their marriage. The burden of family duties increased over time and narrowed her ability as an artist. He then had to be committed to an asylum due to his deteriorating mental and physical health. [2] Clara's parents had irreconcilable differences, in part due to her father's unyielding nature. [97] She was one of the first pianists to perform from memory, making it the standard for concerts. [31] Their first son, Emil, died in 1847, aged only 1. The following day, she played her husband's Piano Concerto with Bargiel conducting. Geburtstag der Pianistin und Komponistin", "Linds and Clärchens: Women Musicians and National Currency", "Review: Clara Schumann – Three Romances for violin and piano, Op. Robert and Clara decided to go to court and sue him. Her father Friedrich Wieck was a piano teacher and music dealer and her mother Marianne was a concert pianist. "Clara Schumann: A Composer's Wife as Composer. Clara stopped composing at the young age of 36. [27] The two were particularly noted for their playing of Beethoven's violin sonatas. In 1837, when she was 18, he proposed to her and she accepted. In July, she consulted a doctor, who having massaged the arm, advised her to practice for only one hour a day. She grew up in Leipzig, where her father, Friedrich Wieck, was a professional pianist and teacher, and her mother an accomplished singer. The love story of Clara and Robert Schumann is a unique one in musical history. [16] Friedrich was strongly opposed to the marriage, and refused his permission. Prior to beginning her lessons, young Clara had only … [49] Her fame attracted students from abroad, including Britain and the United States. Her husband was permanently institutionalized after a mental collapse. She lived during a time when female musicians of her caliber were extremely rare to find and despite being one of the few women in a male-dominated field, she enjoyed a productive career that spanned six decades. Child prodigy, sought-after concert pianist, mother of seven surviving children, Clara Schumann was also a burgeoning composer in a male-dominated musical world… On 8 November 1830 an 11 year-old wunderkid by the name of Clara Wieck made her official debut at Leipzig’s Gewandhaus. Birth Name was Clara Josephine Wieck. She travelled extensively and performed before sold-out audiences and received extravagant praise from the critics. Brahms dedicated the variations to both Schumanns, hoping that Robert would be released soon and rejoined with his family. [49][50] She had chosen Frankfurt among offers from Stuttgart, Hannover, and Berlin, because the director, Joachim Raff, had accepted her conditions: she could not teach more than 1-1/2 hours per day, was free to teach at her home, and had four months of vacation and time off for short tours in winter. Clara Josephine Wieck [ˈklaːʀa ˈjoːzɛfiːn ˈviːk] was born in Leipzig on 13 September 1819 to Friedrich Wieck and his wife Mariane (née Tromlitz). "I think I played fresher than ever", she wrote to Brahms, "What I liked very much about the concert was that I was able to give Woldemar the direction of it, who had longed for such an opportunity for years. [10], From September 1831 to April 1832, Clara toured Paris and other European cities, accompanied by her father. Most family members left and hid in a "neighbourhood security brigade", but on 7 May, she bravely walked back to Dresden to rescue her three children who had been left with a maid,[62] defying a pack of armed men who confronted her, then walked back out of the city through the dangerous areas again. [19], In February 1854, Robert Schumann had a mental collapse, attempted suicide, and was admitted, at his request, to a sanatorium in the village of Endenich near Bonn, where he stayed for the last two years of his life. Robert's Birthday: June 8th. Clara Schumann’s bicentenary falls this year: there has never been a better moment to put this 19th-century musical superwoman into the spotlight. As a wedding gift, Robert Schumann gave his bride a diary. From an early age Clara's prodigious talent at the piano was esteemed throughout Europe. She gave concerts and taught, and she did most of the work of organizing her own concert tours. When she was 18, she performed a series of recitals in Vienna from December 1837 to April 1838. [34] By October 1875, she had recovered enough to begin another tour in Germany. She travelled extensively and performed before sold-out audiences and received extravagant praise from the critics. [6], In the early 1840s the Schumanns were interested in the works of Franz Liszt and his young composer friends of what eventually became known as the New German School,[76] but in the second half of the decade they both became openly hostile toward Liszt[77] because of their more musically conservative outlook and beliefs,[78] Clara more so than Robert, as she had long been the more conservative aesthete in the Schumann marriage. Schumann famously rescued her children from violence during the May Uprising in Dresden in 1849. However, as she became a more independent artist, her repertoire contained mainly music by leading composers. As a little girl she received training in piano, violin, singing, theory, harmony, composition, and counterpoint, and started performing at the age of eight under her father’s watchful eyes. She cannot work at it regularly, and I am often disturbed to think how many profound ideas are lost because she cannot work them out. Clara Wieck Schumann was more popular as a concert pianist than as a composer as she herself did not have much confidence in her ability to compose. Born to a highly ambitious musically inclined father, she was trained for success from a young age. "[12] Chopin described her playing to Franz Liszt, who came to hear one of Wieck's concerts and subsequently praised her extravagantly in a letter that was published in the Parisian Revue et Gazette Musicale and later, in translation, in the Leipzig journal Neue Zeitschrift für Musik. [6][74], Most of Clara Schumann's music was never played by anyone else and largely forgotten until a resurgence of interest in the 1970s. Clara Schumann née Clara Wieck (1819 – 1896) was a German composer-pianist and wife to Robert Schumann. For Robert's 31st birthday, Clara writes music to a poem that had always shown how she felt for him. [30], During Robert Schumann's last years, confined to an asylum, Brahms was a strong presence for the Schumann family. 20 May 1896 (aged 76) Clara Schumann (1819–1896) was a German pianist and composer in the nineteenth-century Romantic style. She went to England for the first time in 1856 and was invited to play in a London Philharmonic Society concert by conductor William Sterndale Bennett, a good friend of Robert's. 3: Clara Schumann und ihre Freunde 1856–1896, "Schumann [née Wieck], Clara (Josephine)", "Erinnerungen an Clara Schumann : Alleinstehend, berufstätig, kinderreich", "Suffering for Her Art: The Chronic Pain Syndrome of Pianist Clara Wieck-Schumann", "Clara Schumann's collection of playbills: A historiometric analysis of life-span development, mobility, and repertoire canonization", "Dr. Hoch's Konservatorium seit Januar Musikakademie / Bericht vom Festakt zur Verleihung des Status einer Akademie", "When a Friendship Is More Than Friendship: The Tender Letters of Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms", "Pianistin Clara Schumann : Klavierstunde bei der eisernen Meisterin", "Bittersweet symphonies / Brahms's affair with Clara Schumann was a sizzling mess that left his life in chaos and filled his music with yearning", "Clara Schumann und die Berliner Philharmoniker, Zum 200. [102], In 1954, Loretta Young portrayed her on The Loretta Young Show in Season 1, Episode 26: The Clara Schumann Story (first aired on 21 March 1954), in which she supports the composing career of her husband, played by George Nader, alongside Shelley Fabares and Carleton G. She produced one to eight compositions every year beginning at age 11, until her output stopped in 1848, producing only a choral work that year for her husband's birthday and leaving her second piano concerto unfinished. She fully accepted the arrangement of a shared diary as evidenced by her many entries. [67] Her busiest years as a performer were between 1856 and 1873, after her husband's death. [94] Wagner had poked fun at the musical conservatives in an essay, portraying them as "a musical temperance society" awaiting a Messiah. [106][107] The back of the banknote shows a grand piano she played and the exterior of Dr. Hoch's Konservatorium, where she taught. 8) and the popular Scherzo (Op. He taught her piano and composition, and she had written a piano concerto by the age of fifteen. [105], An image of Clara Schumann from an 1835 lithograph by Andreas Staub was featured on the 100 Deutsche Mark banknote from 2 January 1989 until the adoption of the euro on 1 January 2002. Clara Schumann was a virtuosic pianist and a brilliant composer, but is still best known for being the wife of Robert Schumann. Learn more about his life and works in this article. She somehow juggled her domestic duties with her professional career though she did not receive much support from her husband. As a child prodigy, Clara Wieck Schumann had become quite a sensation in Europe by the time she reached her mid-teens. While taking lessons, he rented a room in the Wieck household and stayed about a year. When she was 14 and her future husband 23, he wrote to her: Tomorrow precisely at eleven o'clock I will play the adagio from Chopin's Variations and at the same time I shall think of you very intently, exclusively of you. She gave some advice about the Adagio, which he took to heart. [12] Franz Grillparzer, Austria's leading dramatic poet, wrote a poem entitled "Clara Wieck and Beethoven" after hearing her perform Beethoven's Appassionata sonata during one of these recitals. B. Zerbini usually played on the same concert programs. Clara Wieck was born on September 13, 1819, in Leipzig. Clara Schumann. [56] Their daughter Julie died in 1872, leaving two small children aged only 2 and 7, then raised by their grandmother. At once artist, composer, editor, teacher, wife, and mother of eight children, she was an important force in … Schumann admired Clara's playing so much that he asked permission from his mother to stop studying law, which had never interested him much, and take music lessons with Clara's father. [11] The tour marked her transition from a child prodigy to a young woman performer. [70], Schumann was the authoritative editor, aided by Brahms and others, of her husband's works for the publishing firm of Breitkopf & Härtel. [35], Clara Schumann first toured England in April 1856, while her husband was still living but unable to travel. [31] She planned a second piano concerto, but only a Konzertsatz in F minor from 1847 survived. children: Elise, Emil, Eugenie, Felix, Ferdinand, Julie, Ludwig, Marie, See the events in life of Clara Wieck Schumann in Chronological Order. Though Brahms secretly held Wagner's music in high esteem,[96] and eventually publicly praised Liszt's works as well, and several of the proponents and signers of the manifesto, including Joachim, relented and joined the "other side", and the controversy died down, Clara Schumann remained steadfast in her disapproval of the New German School's music during her lifetime. Regarded as one of the most distinguished pianists of the Romantic era, she exerted her influence over a 61-year concert career, changing the format and repertoire of the piano recital from displays of virtuosity to programs of serious works. In addition to solo piano recitals, chamber music, and accompanying singers, she continued to perform frequently with orchestras. She was influenced by both of her musically inclined parents and proved to be a child prodigy. She gave her first solo concert at the Leipzig Gewandhaus in 1830, at the age of 11. [6][49][51], She was the only woman on the faculty. The Weimar school promoted the idea of program music,[85] while both the Schumanns and Brahms of the Leipzig/Berlin school were strict in their stance that music must and can only be absolute music,[86] a term derisively coined by Wagner. Romantic Visions of a Classical Masterpiece. Part of her responsibility included earning money by giving concerts, though she continued to play throughout her life, not just for the income but because she was an artist by training and nature. [11] Her Paris recital was poorly attended because many people had fled the city due to an outbreak of cholera. ", Gould, John: "What Did They Play? In May 1856, she played Schumann's Piano Concerto in A minor with the New Philharmonic Society[b] conducted by Dr Wylde, who as she said had "led a dreadful rehearsal" and "could not grasp the rhythm of the last movement". [93] The New Weimar Club, a formal society with Liszt at its center, held an anniversary celebration of the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik, the magazine Robert Schumann had founded, in his birthplace Zwickau, and conspicuously neglected to invite members of the opposing party, including his widow, Clara. [64] During this period, she experienced success as a performer in Britain, where her 1865 performance of Beethoven's Piano Concerto in G major was met with enormous applause. Brahms played some of his piano solo compositions for the Schumanns, and they were deeply impressed. Should I expect to be the one? Meanwhile she had fallen in love with one of her father’s students and desperately wanted to marry him. She premiered many works by her husband and by Brahms in public. Another of her students, Carl Friedberg, carried the tradition to the Juilliard School in America, where his students included Malcolm Frager and Bruce Hungerford. Brahms later thought to publish them anonymously, but eventually they were issued as his four Ballades, Op. Robert Schumann, German Romantic composer renowned particularly for his piano music, songs (lieder), and orchestral music. [63] Over 1,300 concert programs from her performances throughout Europe between 1831 through 1889 have been preserved. 17 (1846) and Three Romances for Violin and Piano, Op. Her eldest living son Ludwig suffered from mental illness like his father and, in her words, eventually had to be "buried alive" in an institution. "[42] Marie also wrote: "For the longer journeys we had a saloon [car], comfortably furnished with arm-chairs and sofas... the journey ... was very comfortable." Schumann was born Clara Wieck into a middle-class family in Leipzig, Germany, on September 13, 1819. [103], Two more recent German films are Frühlingssinfonie (Spring Symphony) (1983), starring Nastassja Kinski as Clara,[104] and the 2008 Helma Sanders-Brahms' film Geliebte Clara (Beloved Clara), where she is portrayed by Martina Gedeck. She outlived four of their children and died at the age of 76. An early end to composing. Clara Wieck-Schumann – biographical introduction Clara Schumann née Wieck (Leipzig September 13, 1819 – May 20, 1896 Frankfurt/Main) is one of the most famous female pianists in the 19th century. "[70] Her husband also expressed concern about the effect on her composing output: Clara has composed a series of small pieces, which show a musical and tender ingenuity such as she has never attained before. [31] She trained only advanced pupils, mostly young women, while her two daughters gave lessons to beginners. Clara raised her 8 children, supported Robert’s successful career as a composer, and performed regularly. Even though she gave birth to eight children, four of them predeceased her. Träumerei (Dreaming), the oldest known Schumann film, premiered on 3 May 1944 in Zwickau. [34] She was the first to perform many of his works in public, including the Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel, a solo piano work written by Brahms in 1861. Clara Schumann: Prodigy, Rebel, and Renowned Pianist 15-year-old Clara Wieck in 1835 Clara Wieck (pronounced 'KLAH-rah VEEK') was born in Germany in 1819. She started her outrageous career as child of prodigy on the piano and performed for six decades on the center stages in whole Europe. Encouraged by her father, she studied piano from the age of five and by 1835 had established a reputation throughout Europe as a child prodigy. [6][9] The same year, she performed at the Leipzig home of Ernst Carus, director of the mental hospital at Colditz Castle. She performed extensively and regularly throughout Germany during these decades, and had engagements in Austria, Hungary, Belgium, Holland, and Switzerland. [13] On 15 March, she was named a Königliche und Kaiserliche Österreichische Kammer-virtuosin ("Royal and Imperial Austrian Chamber Virtuoso"),[14] Austria's highest musical honor. The couple wrote and published one joint composition in 1841, setting a cycle of poems by Friedrich Rückert called Liebesfrühling (Spring of Love) in Zwölf Lieder auf F. Rückerts Liebesfrühling, her Op. This is a page dedicated to the amazing Clara Schumann. [6] Her chamber works include the Piano Trio in G minor, Op. Wikipedia. [6], In 1835, she performed her Piano Concerto in A minor with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, conducted by Mendelssohn. In her early years, her repertoire, selected by her father, was showy and in the style common to the time, with works by Friedrich Kalkbrenner, Adolf von Henselt, Sigismond Thalberg, Henri Herz, Johann Peter Pixis, Carl Czerny and her own compositions. With Martina Gedeck, Pascal Greggory, Malik Zidi, Aline Annessy. They were dedicated to Joachim, who performed them for George V of Hanover, who declared them a "marvellous, heavenly pleasure".[68][69]. He appeared to recognize her, but could only speak a few words. Married at 18 in 1837 to Robert Schumann. This video is a biography of Clara Schumann for Music History II. [52] She was buried in Bonn at Alter Friedhof next to her husband, according to her own wish. In March 1838, she was named a ‘Königliche und Kaiserliche Kammervirtuosin’ ("Royal and Imperial Chamber Virtuoso"), Austria's highest musical honor. 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