The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. In the 29-volume second edition. Grove Music Online /General Editor – Stanley Sadie. Oxford University Press. 2001.

Schumann, Robert

(b Zwickau, Saxony, 8 June 1810; d Endenich, nr Bonn, 29 July 1856). German composer and music critic. While best remembered for his piano music and songs, and some of his symphonic and chamber works, Schumann made significant contributions to all the musical genres of his day and cultivated a number of new ones as well. His dual interest in music and literature led him to develop a historically informed music criticism and a compositional style deeply indebted to literary models. A leading exponent of musical Romanticism, he had a powerful impact on succeeding generations of European composers.

1. Formative years: Zwickau, 1810–28.

2. Jean Paul and Schubert: Leipzig, 1828–9.

3. The decision for music: Heidelberg, 1829–30.

4. Discoveries and disappointments: Leipzig, 1830–33.

5. The music critic: Leipzig, 1833–4.

6. The Davidsbündler comes of age: Leipzig, 1834–8.

7. Viennese prospects, 1838–9.

8. The battle for Clara, 1839–40.

9. The aesthetics of the ‘Liederjahr’, 1840–41.

10. The ‘system’ of genres.

11. The symphonic year, 1841.

12. The chamber music year, 1842–3.

13. The oratorio year, 1843.

14. Russia and after, 1844.

15. A new manner of composing: Dresden, 1845–6.

16. The musical dramatist: Dresden, 1847–8.

17. Unbounded creativity: Dresden, 1848–50.

18. Director in Düsseldorf, 1850–54.

19. The late styles.

20. Endenich, 1854–6.

21. Reception.

WORKS

BIBLIOGRAPHY

JOHN DAVERIO (work-list with ERIC SAMS)

Schumann, Robert

1. Formative years: Zwickau, 1810–28.

The fifth and last child of August Schumann and Johanna Christiana Schumann (née Schnabel), Robert Schumann was born into a household dominated by literary activity. (There is no evidence for a middle name ‘Alexander’, given in some sources; his birth and death certificates both give ‘Robert Schumann’. Possibly Alexander is a corruption of his teenage pseudonym ‘Skülander’.) His father, an author of chivalric romances and a tireless lexicographer, amassed a small fortune by translating Walter Scott and Byron into German. He was also a book dealer, and Robert, his favourite child, was able to spend many hours poring over the classics of literature.

Between his third and fifth years, Schumann was placed under the care of Eleonore Ruppius, whom he later described warmly as a second mother. Having already displayed a talent for singing, he began piano lessons at the age of seven with J.G. Kuntsch, organist at St Marien, Zwickau; at the same time he attended the private school of the archdeacon H. Döhner, where he studied Latin, Greek and French. Within a year he had composed several dances (now lost) for keyboard. Another spur to his musical imagination came in 1818, when he accompanied his mother to Carlsbad and had a fleeting encounter with the pianist-composer Ignaz Moscheles.

Schumann's childhood idyll came to an end with his entry into the Zwickau Gymnasium in 1819 or 1820. Shortly thereafter he and his brother Karl organized extempore theatrical productions in their home. In addition, he made his first appearances as a pianist in 1821 and 1822, in performances of variation sets (some for piano, Four hands) by Pleyel, Cramer, Ries, Moscheles and Weber. By this time he was also taking flute and cello lessons from Meissner, the municipal music director, and soon undertook two compositional projects, both dating from 1822: a setting of Psalm cl for soprano and alto, with unusual instrumentation (on the title-page designated ‘Oeuv. 1’); and an overture and chorus (Chor von Landleuten). An entry in his later ‘Projektenbuch’ alludes to the beginnings of an opera.

Although only a middling pupil, Schumann showed a keen interest in belles-lettres from his 13th year. At about this time he began to gather his own literary efforts – poems, dramatic fragments, biographical sketches of famous composers – under the pseudonym ‘Skülander’, in a commonplace-book entitled Blätter und Blümchen aus der goldenen Aue. In the autumn of 1825 he and ten fellow students formed a ‘Litterarischer Verein’, the meetings of which featured readings from the monuments of German literature and discussions of the members’ original creations. Before its disbanding in February 1828, the Verein provided Schumann with a forum for the systematic study of Schiller's dramas and the essays of Herder and Friedrich Schlegel. Late in 1827 he developed a passion for the idiosyncratic writings of J.P.F. Richter (known as Jean Paul).

During his period as chief organizer of the Litterarischer Verein, Schumann tried his hand at a variety of literary genres, including metric translations of Greek and Latin verse (Idyllen aus dem Griechischen des Bion, Theocritus und Moschus), lyric poetry (more than 30 poems gathered in Allerley aus der Feder Roberts an der Mulde), drama (seven fragments survive, one of which treats the Coriolan story) and criticism (essays on a variety of aesthetic topics). In the diary he started early in 1827 (Tage des Jünglinglebens) Schumann recorded his painful reactions to the death of his father (from a nervous disorder) and of his 19-year-old sister Emilie (probably suicide) in the summer of 1826. The diary also tells of his current infatuation with the young Liddy Hempel and his past flirtation with Nanni Petsch.

Schumann continued to pursue his musical interests during his middle and later teenage years. While preparing for the meetings of the Litterarischer Verein, he also came to know some of Beethoven's string quartets, Mozart's operas and the keyboard music of Haydn and Louis Ferdinand, Prince of Prussia. Unfortunately, August Schumann's attempts to retain Weber as a composition teacher for his talented son came to nothing, owing to the death of both men in 1826. Although Schumann began an E minor piano concerto in 1827 (sketches for another, in E , date from the next year) and claimed to have completed many songs and piano pieces by that time, none of the solo keyboard compositions survives. 13 songs on texts by Kerner, Byron, Ernst Schulze, J.G. Jacobi and Schumann himself date from the summers of 1827 and 1828, and were probably inspired by Agnes Carus, an attractive woman eight years Schumann's senior, a talented singer, and the wife of Dr Ernst August Carus (nephew of an old family friend). Ranging from simple strophic to complex through-composed designs, the lieder attest the young composer's attainment of an impressive level of technical mastery. When Gottlob Wiedebein, the Brunswick Kapellmeister to whom Schumann sent his Kerner settings in July 1828, responded with encouraging words but warned against submission to unbridled fantasy, he was probably reacting to the frequent tempo shifts, wayward modulations and irregular phrase lengths in a song such an An Anna I. On the one hand, the early lieder fulfilled a youthful ideal: the appearance of ‘poet and composer in one person’; on the other, they offered a repository of ideas for several of the piano works of the next decade: the Intermezzos op.4, the F minor Sonata op.11 and G minor Sonata op.22.

Schumann, Robert