Robert Schumann (June 8, 1810 - July 29, 1856) was a famous German composer and music critic of the Romantic Era. He was known for many of his piano, vocal, choral and orchestral works, but had only composed mainly for piano up until 1840 when he married his wife Clara Wieck. Out of Robert Schumann’s short, well-lived life, he only wrote four symphonies in his lifetime. These Symphonies were: (1841) Symphony No. 1 in B-flat major, Op. 38 ( “Spring Symphony”), (1847) Symphony No. 2 in C major, Op. 61, (1850), Symphony No. 3 in E-flat major, Op. 97 (“Rhenish”), and ( 1841) Symphony No. 4 in D minor, Op. 120. 1841 was named Schumann’s symphony year, because it was the year that most of his symphonies were composed and performed, causing him to be one of the highlights of the Romantic Era. In this paper, drawing upon scores and recordings from Robert Schumann's Symphony in D minor Op. 120 and Symphony in B flat Major, op. 38 "Spring", peer reviewed articles and dissertations, and books published, I will argue that, Robert Schumann's Symphony year was in fact the year 1841, the year where his Symphony's became successful and prominent.
Robert Schumann was a composer and music critic who lived from 1810-1856. He considered himself to be the one to follow in Beethoven and Schubert's footsteps. At the end of his career, Schumann had left his audiences quite puzzled, even his wife Clara Wiek Schumann found some his works to be "confusing and out there". During the late 19th century, Schumann's works mostly were considered undistinguished, gray, and colorless, but that was the opposite of what Schumann intended, he had intended to "reinvent instrumental music".
He was born in 1810 in Zwickau. His father had been a bookseller, and wanted...
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...o. 1 in B flat major, Op. 38 "Spring"." YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ji7_jbFDgY (accessed February 28, 2014).
Book:
Schumann, Robert, Clara Schumann, and Gerd Nauhaus. The marriage diaries of Robert & Clara Schumann: from their wedding day through the Russia trip. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1993.
Journal Article:
Spitzer, Michael . "Robert Schumann and the Study of Orchestral Composition: The Genesis of the First Symphony Op. 38." jstor.org. http://www.jstor.org.lib-e2.lib.ttu.edu/stable/736850?seq=2 (accessed February 28, 2014).
Journal Article:
"Symphony No. 1, Spring Op. 38." The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. http://content.thespco.org/music/compositions/symphony-no-1-spring-robert-schumann/ (accessed February 28, 2014).
Book:
Worthen, John. Robert Schumann: life and death of a musician. New Haven [Conn.: Yale University Press, 2007.
Peyser, J. (1986) The Orchestra: Origins and Transformations. New York: Charles Scribner’s and Sons. Sadie, S. (1980) New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.
Johannes Brahms was a German Composer, Pianist and conductor of the 19th century or the Romantic period. He was one of the 3 B's or the Big three: Bach, Beethoven and Brahms. Johannes was a very self-critic man he burned many of his pieces before he could get anyone's opinion on them and he burned all of his compositions that he wrote before the age of 19.
Clara Schumann was an accomplished composer of her times but recognition of this feat did not come with ease. Clara faced many of the common stumbling blocks to women during this time to include the idea that a woman’s place was in the home and that her life focus is to please her husband, run the home and take care of the children. Despite this mindset, this musical prodigy was able to wittingly break ground for other women to come after her. Even in death, as history cannot be rewritten, all of her musical accomplishments are rarely mentioned in musical history textbooks.
...m a desire to have his music see any sort of success. It is often forgotten that composers write music as a career, and they write it for the audiences of their era. They have a deep passion for music that compels their artistry, but, after all, they need to sell copies or have their music performed in order to put food on the table. In the early Romantic period especially, a sharp, witty, ironic sounding song cycle may not have been appealing to an audience expecting beautiful sentimental melodies. Schumann may have known that he was simplifying Heine's complex text into something less extreme, he also was composing music in a style he and his audience were familiar with. Thankfully for the listener, this style is a beautiful one, and despite Jack Stein's criticism, I'm sure he agrees that Dichterliebe is a song cycle that will be loved for centuries to come.
John Schumann is one of the very few songwriters who has changed the way a nation thinks. John first
Joseph Haydn and Ludwig van Beethoven. Two composers who marked the beginning and the end of the Classical Period respectively. By analysing the last piano sonata of Haydn (Piano Sonata No. 62 in E-flat major (Hob. XVI:52)) and the first and last piano sonatas of Beethoven (Piano Sonata No. 1 in F minor Op. 2, No.1, Piano Sonata No. 32 in C minor Op. 111), this essay will study the development of Beethoven’s composition style and how this conformed or didn’t conform to the Classical style. The concepts of pitch and expressive techniques will be focused on, with a broader breakdown on how these two concepts affect many of the other concepts of music. To make things simpler, this essay will analyse only the first movements of each of the sonatas mentioned.
- Norris, Jeremy Paul. The development of the Russian piano concerto in the nineteenth century. Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1988. Print.
Major works by Clara Schumann included ‘Quatre Polonaises pour le pianoforte’, published in 1831, ‘4 Pièces caractéristiques for piano’ published in 1836, ‘Piano Trio in G minor’, published in 1846, and ‘Drei romanzen für pianoforte und violine’, published in 1855. In 1838, Clara was awarded the Royal and Imperial Chamber Virtuoso, Austria's highest musical honor. She was one of the most prominent female composers of the Romantic era, during a time there weren’t
It is clear that Beethoven’s stands as being significant in development of the string quartet to a massive extent in creativity and innovation. His early quartets show great influence of those from the Classical period and with his own, has influenced his contemporaries and later composers. The quartets published later in his life show even greater imagination and use of expression. It is also through similar uses of texture, harmony, rhythm and counterpoint that composers of the Romantic period and the 20th century wrote their own string quartets. Beethoven’s however prove a huge advancement in how string quartets are written and the intensity of emotions that they portray.
Zaslaw, Neal. Mozart’s Symphonies: Context, Performance Practice, Recteption. United States: Oxford University Press. 1989, Print.
Two Rhapsodies, Op.79 – Johannes Brahms Johannes Brahms, (1833-1897) was a leading German composer and pianist of the Romantic period, who composed in almost every genre except the opera. Brahms, as a composer, was also well-known in his expertise on manipulating rhythm and movement. Brahms’ works features a great variety of emotion from amusement to sorrow. The unique texture of every Brahms’ works which he modelled from what he learned in the polyphonic school in the 16th century also differed from his contemporaries. Besides that, Brahms was also an expertise in miniature in his solo piano works.
Introduction The symphonies of Anton Bruckner have been known to be majestically spiritual having ‘cathedrals in sound’. Giving a brief background of the musician and composer, Anton Bruckner was born in Ansfelden. Anton’s father was a school master who did not want that his son be a musician. However, against his father’s will, Anton studied music at St. Florian monastery and became an organ player in the year 1851. Anton was much impressed by the music of Richard Wagner and extensively studied his music and after completing his studies he wrote "Mass in D Minor". At Vienna Conservatory, he was appointed as a music teacher in 1868 and from then on he was all the more the symphonies’ musician. Nevertheless, the symphonies he created did not receive a positive response and were thought about at being "wild" and "nonsensical" (Adante). His music was dominated by Eduard Hanslick. While Anton’s symphonies were most popular, he also wrote Masses, Motets and Chorals, while his symphonies were the most romantic his chorals were both conventional and contrapuntal in technique. About His Symphonies Symphony No. 1: Anton’s first symphony was composed and completed in 1866. In 1868, Anton performed this symphony in Linz, and afterwards left from Vienna where he spent his remaining life. Critics were not favorable towards his first symphony as the audience considered it as rough and too unconventional. Accepting this criticism, Anton revised his first symphony a year after its creation and called the new version of his first symphony as the Linz Version. Ever since, the Linz Version is the most famous and the most performed symphony of Anton. And it is the version mostly performed now. Dr. Carragan prepared a reconstructed version of the...
Democracy Now TV, An interview with Peter Schumann by Amy Godman, 2014, Available at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DrT5TMc21M (Accessed : 23 January 2014)
This movement was also in complete sonata form, like the first, but started out with a fugue, containing timpani solos and then later concluded with an abrupt
Franz Liszt is said to be the most astounding piano virtuosos that existed during the Romantic era. This essay will discuss his achievements as a pianist as well as a composer. This essay will examine his life and will examine what influenced him at an early age. It will also look at his accomplishments as a pianist as well as a composer and examine how he became as well known as he is today. It will use his background to show what exactly influenced him to become a successful pianist and composer and it will discuss how essential he was during the Romantic era.