- Clara Schumann composed her Variationen für das Pianoforte über ein Thema von Robert Schumann in 1853, and the work was published in 1854.1
- This was one of Clara Schumann’s last compositions. She wrote it during May and June 1853, shortly before Robert’s breakdown, which led to her cessation of composing.2
- This work is based on a theme from the first selection, “Albumblatt” (Album Page), in Schumann’s Bunte Blätter (Colorful Leaves [i.e. “colorful pages”]), Op. 99.3
- Clara Schumann dedicated this piece to her husband4 and gave it to him as a gift on the last birthday he would spend at home. By the time this piece was published, Robert had been institutionalized following his suicide attempt.5
- The coda of this work quotes a theme from Clara Schumann’s Op. 3, Romance variée (1833), the first work she ever dedicated to Robert. She was 13 when she wrote her Op. 3. After Robert received Clara’s Op. 3, he based a composition of his own on the work’s theme: Impromptus sur une romance de Clara Wieck, Op. 5.6
- Johannes Brahms came to stay with the Schumann family shortly after Robert’s crisis, and Brahms wrote his own set of variations on the same theme by Robert at that time.7 Brahms dedicated his Variations on a Theme by Robert Schumann, Op. 9, to Clara Schumann.
Sources
- Nancy B. Reich and Natasha Loges, “Schumann [née Wieck], Clara,” Grove Music Online (March 29, 2021), accessed May 5, 2022, https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-90000380188.
- Nancy B. Reich, Clara Schumann: The Artist and The Woman (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1988), 232.
- Ibid.
- Clara Schumann, Variationen für das Pianoforte über ein Thema von Robert Schumann (Leipzig: Breitkopf und Härtel, 1854).
- Reich and Loges, “Schumann [née Wieck], Clara,” Grove Music Online.
- Reich, Clara Schumann: The Artist and The Woman, 232.
- Ibid., 232, 233.
Cut IDs
23408