121-459: Eight Songs may refer to: Music [ edit ] Eight Songs , Op. 47 (1893), by Edward Alexander MacDowell Eight Songs , Op. 57 (1909), compositions by Jean Sibelius 8 Songs , an EP version of Melvins! (album) by the Melvins See also [ edit ] Eight Lust Songs (2007), by Michael Nyman Eight Songs for
242-452: A Piano Quintet and a Piano Quartet . During the rest of the 1840s, between bouts of mental and physical ill health, he composed a variety of piano and other pieces and went with his wife on concert tours in Europe. His only opera, Genoveva (1850), was not a success and has seldom been staged since. Schumann and his family moved to Düsseldorf in 1850 in the hope that his appointment as
363-707: A Requiem Mass , described by the critic Ivan March as "long-neglected and under-prized". Like Mozart before him, Schumann was haunted by the conviction that the Mass was his own requiem. All of Schumann's major works and most of the minor ones have been recorded. From the 1920s his music has had a prominent place in the catalogues. In the 1920s Hans Pfitzner recorded the symphonies, and other early recordings were conducted by Georges Enescu and Toscanini. Large-scale performances with modern symphony orchestras have been recorded under conductors including Herbert von Karajan , Wolfgang Sawallisch and Rafael Kubelík , and from
484-453: A Mad King , a 1969 composition by Peter Maxwell Davies Eight Songs for Greg Sage and the Wipers , a 1993 album by various artists 8 Songs About a Girl , a 2011 album by Deep Dark Robot Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Eight Songs . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change
605-475: A complete listing MacDowell published two books of Technical Exercises for piano; piano duet transcriptions of Hamlet and Ophelia for orchestra (Op. 22); First Suite for orchestra (Op. 42); and a piano solo version of Op. 42, No. 4, The Shepherdess' Song , renamed The Song of the Shepherdess . MacDowell composed his First Piano Concerto in the key of A minor in 1885 and published it as his Op.15. It
726-493: A composer beyond solo piano works. During 1840 Schumann turned his attention to song, producing more than half his total output of Lieder , including the cycles Myrthen ("Myrtles", a wedding present for Clara), Frauenliebe und Leben ("Woman's Love and Life"), Dichterliebe ("Poet's Love"), and settings of words by Joseph von Eichendorff , Heinrich Heine and others. In 1841 Schumann focused on orchestral music. On 31 March his First Symphony , The Spring ,
847-480: A concert tour of Russia; her husband joined her. They met the leading figures of the Russian musical scene, including Mikhail Glinka and Anton Rubinstein and were both immensely impressed by Saint Petersburg and Moscow. The tour was an artistic and financial success but it was arduous, and by the end Schumann was in a poor state both physically and mentally. After the couple returned to Leipzig in late May he sold
968-560: A daughter in September, the first of the Schumanns' seven children to survive. The following year Schumann turned his attention to chamber music. He studied works by Haydn and Mozart, despite an ambivalent attitude to the former, writing: "Today it is impossible to learn anything new from him. He is like a familiar friend of the house whom all greet with pleasure and with esteem, but who has ceased to arouse any particular interest". He
1089-624: A developing reputation. According to Chissell, her concerto debut at the Leipzig Gewandhaus on 9 November 1835, with Mendelssohn conducting, "set the seal on all her earlier successes, and there was now no doubting that a great future lay before her as a pianist". Schumann had watched her career approvingly since she was nine, but only now fell in love with her. His feelings were reciprocated: they declared their love to each other in January 1836. Schumann expected that Wieck would welcome
1210-473: A large project, the largest I've yet undertaken – it's not an opera – I believe it's well-nigh a new genre for the concert hall". Szenen aus Goethes Faust (Scenes from Goethe's Faust), composed between 1844 and 1853, is another hybrid work, operatic in manner but written for concert performance and labelled an oratorio by the composer. The work was never given complete in Schumann's lifetime, although
1331-457: A letter of introduction from a mutual friend, the violinist Joseph Joachim . Brahms had recently written the first of his three piano sonatas, and played it to Schumann, who rushed excitedly out of the room and came back leading his wife by the hand, saying "Now, my dear Clara, you will hear such music as you never heard before; and you, young man, play the work from the beginning". Schumann was so impressed that he wrote an article – his last – for
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#17327985839381452-405: A little son". He was the fifth and last child of August Schumann and his wife, Johanna Christiane ( née Schnabel). August, not only a bookseller but also a lexicographer, author and publisher of chivalric romances , made considerable sums from his German translations of writers such as Cervantes , Walter Scott and Lord Byron . Robert, his favourite child, was able to spend many hours exploring
1573-496: A mixed critical reception, both during his lifetime and since, but there is widespread agreement about the high quality of his solo piano music. In his youth the familiar Austro-German tradition of Bach , Mozart and Beethoven was temporarily eclipsed by a fashion for the flamboyant showpieces of composers such as Moscheles . Schumann's first published work, the Abegg Variations , is in the latter style. But he revered
1694-490: A multidisciplinary artists' retreat, continued to honor the composer's memory after his death by supporting the work of other artists in an interdisciplinary environment. With time, it created an important part of MacDowell's legacy. Marian MacDowell led the Edward MacDowell Association and Colony for more than 25 years, strengthening its initial endowment by resuming her piano performances and creating
1815-564: A pianist was evident from an early age: in 1850 the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung (Universal Musical Journal) printed a biographical sketch of Schumann which included an account from contemporary sources that even as a boy he possessed a special talent for portraying feelings and characteristic traits in melody: From 1820 Schumann attended the Zwickau Lyceum, the local high school of about two hundred boys, where he remained till
1936-456: A place proper to its significance in the history of American music. As romantic tradition in music never lost its relevance and importance, the twenty-first century brought a reassessment of MacDowell's legacy not only as a talented piano virtuoso and piano composer, but also as one of America's preeminent composers. On February 14, 2000, he was inducted into a national Classical Music Hall of Fame . MacDowell's two concertos are now perceived as
2057-511: A slow movement". Its unorthodox structure may have made it less appealing and it is not often performed. Schumann composed six overtures, three of them for theatrical performance, preceding Byron 's Manfred (1852), Goethe 's Faust (1853) and his own Genoveva . The other three were stand-alone concert works inspired by Schiller's The Bride of Messina , Shakespeare's Julius Caesar and Goethe's Hermann and Dorothea . The Piano Concerto (1845) quickly became and has remained one of
2178-676: A successful secular oratorio , Das Paradies und die Peri (Paradise and the Peri ), based on an oriental poem by Thomas Moore . It was premiered at the Gewandhaus on 4 December and repeat performances followed at Dresden on 23 December, Berlin early the following year, and London in June 1856, when Schumann's friend William Sterndale Bennett conducted a performance given by the Philharmonic Society before Queen Victoria and
2299-484: A suitable husband for his daughter, Schumann married Clara in 1840. In the years immediately following their wedding Schumann composed prolifically, writing, first, songs and song‐cycles including Frauenliebe und Leben ("Woman's Love and Life") and Dichterliebe ("Poet's Love"). He turned his attention to orchestral music in 1841, completing the first of his four symphonies. In the following year he concentrated on chamber music, writing three string quartets ,
2420-403: A time he also had cello and flute lessons with one of the municipal musicians, Carl Gottlieb Meissner. Throughout his childhood and youth his love of music and literature ran in tandem, with poems and dramatic works produced alongside small-scale compositions, mainly piano pieces and songs. He was not a musical child prodigy like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart or Felix Mendelssohn , but his talent as
2541-547: A trend towards playing the orchestral music with smaller forces in historically informed performance . After the successful premiere in 1841 of the first of his four symphonies the Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung described it as "well and fluently written ... also, for the most part, knowledgeably, tastefully, and often quite successfully and effectively orchestrated", although a later critic called it "inflated piano music with mainly routine orchestration". Later in
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#17327985839382662-752: A while in Germany, where he composed, performed on stage and gave piano lessons. He taught piano at various places in Darmstadt during 1881–1884, including the Schmitt's Akademie für Tonkunst (now known as the Akademie für Tonkunst ), and in Wiesbaden , 1884–1888. In 1884, MacDowell married Marian Griswold Nevins , an American who had been one of his piano students in Frankfurt for three years. About
2783-429: A wide circle of donors, especially among women's clubs and musical sororities and around 400 MacDowell music clubs . The Edward MacDowell Association backed many American composers, including Aaron Copland , Edgard Varese , Roger Sessions , William Schuman , Walter Piston , Samuel Barber , Elliott Carter , and Leonard Bernstein , in the beginning phases of their careers by awarding them residencies, fellowships, and
2904-705: A window, smiling patiently from time to time at those about him, turning the pages of a book of fairy tales that seemed to give him a definite pleasure, and greeting with a fugitive gleam of recognition certain of his more intimate friends". The Mendelssohn Glee Club raised money to help the MacDowells. Friends launched a public appeal to raise funds for his care; among the signers were Horatio Parker , Victor Herbert , Arthur Foote , George Whitefield Chadwick , Frederick Converse , Andrew Carnegie , J. P. Morgan , New York Mayor Seth Low , and former President Grover Cleveland . Marian MacDowell cared for her husband to
3025-509: A year Schumann called his Liederjahr (year of song). These are Dichterliebe (Poet's Love) comprising sixteen songs with words by Heine; Frauenliebe und Leben (Woman's Love and Life), eight songs setting poems by Adelbert von Chamisso ; and two sets simply titled Liederkreis – German for "Song Cycle" – the Op. 24 set, consisting of nine Heine settings and the Op. 39 set of twelve settings of poems by Eichendorff. Also from 1840
3146-420: Is in three movements: Maestoso - Allegro con fuoco , Andante tranquillo, and Presto Published compositions for orchestra (complete) Published songs Robert Schumann Robert Schumann ( German: [ˈʁoːbɛʁt ˈʃuːman] ; 8 June 1810 – 29 July 1856) was a German composer, pianist, and music critic of the early Romantic era . He composed in all the main musical genres of
3267-516: Is still his piano works and songs from the 1830s and 1840s on which his reputation is primarily based. He had considerable influence in the nineteenth century and beyond. In the German-speaking world the composers Gustav Mahler , Richard Strauss , Arnold Schoenberg and more recently Wolfgang Rihm have been inspired by his music, as were French composers such as Georges Bizet , Gabriel Fauré , Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel . Schumann
3388-542: Is technically challenging for the pianist Schumann also wrote simpler pieces for young players, the best-known of which are his Album für die Jugend (Album for the Young, 1848) and Three Sonatas for Young People (1853). He also wrote some undemanding music with an eye to commercial sales, including the Blumenstück (Flower Piece) and Arabeske (both 1839), which he privately considered "feeble and intended for
3509-401: Is the cycle of short, interrelated pieces, often programmatic , though seldom explicitly so. They include Carnaval , Fantasiestücke , Kreisleriana , Kinderszenen and Waldszenen (Wood Scenes). The critic J. A. Fuller Maitland wrote of the first of these, "Of all the pianoforte works [ Carnaval ] is perhaps the most popular; its wonderful animation and never-ending variety ensure
3630-403: Is the set Schumann wrote as a wedding present to Clara, Myrthen ( Myrtles – traditionally part of a bride's wedding bouquet), which the composer called a song cycle, although comprising twenty-six songs with lyrics from ten different writers this set is a less unified cycle than the others. In a study of Schumann's songs Eric Sams suggests that even here there is a unifying theme, namely
3751-544: The Neue Zeitschrift für Musik titled " Neue Bahnen " (New Paths), extolling Brahms as a musician who was destined "to give expression to his times in ideal fashion". Hall writes that Brahms proved "a personal tower of strength to Clara during the difficult days ahead": in early 1854 Schumann's health deteriorated drastically. On 27 February he attempted suicide by throwing himself into the River Rhine . He
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3872-687: The Musikverein on 1 January 1847 attracted a sparse and unenthusiastic audience, but in Berlin the performance of Das Paradies und die Peri was well received, and the tour gave Schumann the chance to see numerous operatic productions. In the words of Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians , "A regular if not always approving member of the audience at performances of works by Donizetti , Rossini, Meyerbeer , Halévy and Flotow , he registered his 'desire to write operas' in his travel diary". The Schumanns suffered several blows during 1847, including
3993-663: The Cello Concerto (1850) remain in the concert repertoire and are well represented on record. The late Violin Concerto (1853) is less often heard but has received several recordings. Schumann composed a substantial quantity of chamber pieces, of which the best-known and most performed are the Piano Quintet in E ♭ major , Op. 44, the Piano Quartet in the same key (both 1842) and three piano trios,
4114-610: The Edward MacDowell Medal . Between 1925 and 1956, Copland received a fellowship eight times; in 1961 he was awarded the Edward MacDowell Medal, and he served himself for 34 years on the board of Association and Colony. Amy Beach was at MacDowell on fellowships from its beginning for many summers while she was in her middle to later career. After his death, MacDowell was considered a great, internationally known American composer. In 1940, MacDowell
4235-571: The Great C major Symphony . Ferdinand allowed him to take a copy away and Schumann arranged for the work's premiere, conducted by Mendelssohn in Leipzig on 21 March 1839. In the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik Schumann wrote enthusiastically about the work and described its " himmlische Länge " – its "heavenly length" – a phrase that has become common currency in later analyses of the symphony. Schumann and Clara finally married on 12 September 1840,
4356-712: The Neue Zeitschrift , and in December the family moved to Dresden. Schumann had been passed over for the conductorship of the Leipzig Gewandhaus in succession to Mendelssohn, and he thought that Dresden, with a thriving opera house, might be the place where he could, as he now wished, become an operatic composer. His health remained poor. His doctor in Dresden reported complaints "from insomnia, general weakness, auditory disturbances, tremors, and chills in
4477-535: The Prince Consort . Although neglected after Schumann's death it remained popular throughout his lifetime and brought his name to international attention. During 1843 Mendelssohn invited him to teach piano and composition at the new Leipzig Conservatory , and Wieck approached him with an offer of reconciliation. Schumann gladly accepted both, although the resumed relationship with his father-in-law remained polite rather than close. In 1844 Clara embarked on
4598-488: The River Rhine but was rescued and taken to a private sanatorium near Bonn , where he lived for more than two years, dying there at the age of 46. During his lifetime Schumann was recognised for his piano music – often subtly programmatic – and his songs. His other works were less generally admired, and for many years there was a widespread belief that those from his later years lacked the inspiration of his early music. More recently this view has been less prevalent, but it
4719-582: The University of Heidelberg which, unlike Leipzig, offered courses in Roman , ecclesiastical and international law (as well as reuniting Schumann with his close friend Eduard Röller who was a student there). After matriculating at the university on 30 July 1829 he travelled in Switzerland and Italy from late August to late October. He was greatly taken with Rossini 's operas and the bel canto of
4840-410: The first and second from 1847 and the third from 1851. The Quintet was written for and dedicated to Clara Schumann. It is described by the musicologist Linda Correll Roesner as "a very 'public' and brilliant work that nonetheless manages to incorporate a private message" by quoting a theme composed by Clara. Schumann's writing for piano and string quartet – two violins, one viola and one cello –
4961-480: The "most important works in the genre by an American composer other than Gershwin". His four sonatas, two orchestral suites and multiple solo piano pieces are performed and recorded. The following lists were compiled from information in collections of sheet music, Lawrence Gilman's Edward MacDowell: A Study (1908), Oscar Sonneck's Catalogue of First Editions of Edward MacDowell (1917), and John F. Porte's Edward MacDowell (1922). Published compositions for piano,
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5082-525: The German Lied . His affinity with the piano is heard in his accompaniments to his songs, notably in their preludes and postludes, the latter often summing up what has been heard in the song. Schumann acknowledged that he found orchestration a difficult art to master, and many analysts have criticised his orchestral writing. Conductors including Gustav Mahler , Max Reger , Arturo Toscanini , Otto Klemperer and George Szell have made changes to
5203-608: The US in 1987. She finds the work "full of high drama and supercharged emotion. In my opinion, it's very stageworthy, too. It’s not at all static". Unlike the opera, Schumann's secular oratorio Das Paradies und die Peri was an enormous success in his lifetime, although it has since been neglected. Tchaikovsky described it as a "divine work" and said he "knew nothing higher in all of music." The conductor Sir Simon Rattle called it "The great masterpiece you've never heard, and there aren't many of those now. ... In Schumann's life it
5324-613: The United States in the autumn of 1888. He made Boston his new home, where he became well known as a concert pianist and piano teacher. He performed in recitals with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and other American musical organizations. The MacDowells lived in Boston until 1896, when Edward was appointed professor of music at Columbia University , the first music professor in the university's history. He
5445-600: The academic affairs voting rights of Columbia faculty members in the arts and accused MacDowell of unprofessional conduct and sloppy teaching, in February 1904, MacDowell abruptly announced his resignation, raising an unfortunate public controversy. After stepping down from Columbia professorship, MacDowell fell into depression and his health rapidly deteriorated. E. Douglas Bomberger's biography notes that MacDowell suffered from seasonal affective disorder throughout his life, and often made decisions with negative implications in
5566-572: The age of eighteen, studying a traditional curriculum. In addition to his studies he read extensively: among his early enthusiasms were Schiller and Jean Paul . According to the musical historian George Hall, Paul remained Schumann's favourite author and exercised a powerful influence on the composer's creativity with his sensibility and vein of fantasy. Musically, Schumann got to know the works of Haydn , Mozart, Beethoven , and of living composers Carl Maria von Weber , with whom August Schumann tried unsuccessfully to arrange for Robert to study. August
5687-981: The beautiful rural setting. His compositions included two piano concertos, two orchestral suites, four symphonic poems, four piano sonatas , piano suites , and songs. He also published dozens of piano transcriptions of mostly 18th century pre-piano keyboard pieces. From 1896 to 1898, MacDowell also published 13 piano pieces and 4 part songs under the pseudonym of Edgar Thorn. These compositions were not mentioned in Lawrence Gilman's 1909 biography of MacDowell. They were listed without opus numbers in MacDowell's Critical and Historical Essays (1912) and in John F. Porte's Edward MacDowell (1922). They were listed with opus numbers in Oscar Sonneck's Catalogue of First Editions of Edward MacDowell (1917). MacDowell
5808-441: The city's director of music would provide financial security, but his shyness and mental instability made it difficult for him to work with his orchestra and he had to resign after three years. In 1853 the Schumanns met the twenty-year-old Johannes Brahms , whom Schumann praised in an article in the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik . The following year Schumann's always-precarious mental health deteriorated gravely. He threw himself into
5929-416: The classics of literature in his father's collection. Intermittently, between the ages of three and five-and-a-half, he was placed with foster parents, as his mother had contracted typhus . At the age of six Schumann went to a private preparatory school, where he remained for four years. When he was seven he began studying general music and piano with the local organist, Johann Gottfried Kuntsch , and for
6050-432: The composer himself. Although during the twentieth century it became common practice to perform these cycles as a whole, in Schumann's time and beyond it was usual to extract individual songs for performance in recitals. The first documented public performance of a complete Schumann song cycle was not until 1861, five years after the composer's death; the baritone Julius Stockhausen sang Dichterliebe with Brahms at
6171-443: The composer), Friedrich Schorr , Alexander Kipnis and Richard Tauber , followed in a later generation by Elisabeth Schwarzkopf and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau . Although in 1955 the authors of The Record Guide expressed regret that so few of Schumann's songs were available on record, by the early twenty-first century every song was on disc. A complete set was published in 2010 with the songs in chronological order of composition;
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#17327985839386292-594: The conservatory in early 1880 and attended a recital of student compositions, MacDowell performed Robert Schumann 's Quintet, Op. 44 along with a transcription of a Liszt symphonic poem . The next year, he paid a visit to Liszt in Weimar and performed some of his own compositions. Liszt recommended MacDowell's First Modern Suite, Op. 10 to Allgemeiner Deutscher Musikverein for performance and also introduced him to Leipzig music publishers at Breitkopf & Härtel . After finishing his studies in 1881, MacDowell remained for
6413-428: The darkest months of the year. Bomberger advances a new theory for the sudden decline of MacDowell's health: bromide poisoning , which was sometimes mistaken for paresis at the time, as was the case with MacDowell's death certificate. Indeed, MacDowell had long suffered from insomnia, and potassium bromide or sodium bromide were the standard treatment for that condition, and in fact were used in many common remedies of
6534-467: The day before her twenty-first birthday. Hall writes that marriage gave Schumann "the emotional and domestic stability on which his subsequent achievements were founded". Clara made some sacrifices in marrying Schumann: as a pianist of international reputation she was the better-known of the two but her career was continually interrupted by motherhood of their seven children. She inspired Schumann in his composing career, encouraging him to extend his range as
6655-406: The day. MacDowell also was in contact with bromides through his avid hobby of photography. A 1904 accident in which MacDowell was run over by a Hansom cab on Broadway may have contributed to his growing psychiatric disorder and resulting dementia. Of his final years, Lawrence Gilman, a contemporary, described: "His mind became as that of a little child. He sat quietly, day after day, in a chair by
6776-414: The death of their first son, Emil, born the year before, and the deaths of their friends Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn. A second son, Ludwig, and a third, Ferdinand, were born in 1848 and 1849. Genoveva , a four-act opera based on the medieval legend of Genevieve of Brabant , was premiered in Leipzig, conducted by the composer, in June 1850. There were two further performances immediately afterwards, but
6897-590: The deepest spirit of the Romantic era ", and concludes: "As both man and musician, Schumann is recognized as the quintessential artist of the Romantic period in German music. He was a master of lyric expression and dramatic power, perhaps best revealed in his outstanding piano music and songs ..." Schumann believed the aesthetics of all the arts were identical. In his music he aimed at a conception of art in which
7018-456: The earlier German masters, and in his three piano sonatas (composed between 1830 and 1836) and the Fantasie in C (1836) he showed his respect for the earlier Austro-German tradition. Absolute music such as those works is in the minority in his piano compositions, of which many are what Hall calls "character pieces with fanciful names". Schumann's most characteristic form in his piano music
7139-532: The edge of the repertory". With a large family to support, Schumann sought financial security and with the support of his wife he accepted a post as director of music at Düsseldorf in April 1850. Hall comments that in retrospect it can be seen that Schumann was fundamentally unsuited for the post. In Hall's view, Schumann's diffidence in social situations, allied to mental instability, "ensured that initially warm relations with local musicians gradually deteriorated to
7260-552: The end of his life. In 1907, the composer and his wife founded MacDowell (artists' residency and workshop) (formerly known as The MacDowell Colony) by deeding the Hillcrest Farm to the newly established Edward MacDowell Association. MacDowell died in 1908 in New York City and was buried at his beloved Hillcrest Farm. In 1896, Princeton University awarded MacDowell an honorary degree of Doctor of Music. In 1899, he
7381-425: The feet, to a whole range of phobias". From the beginning of 1845 Schumann's health began to improve; he and Clara studied counterpoint together and both produced contrapuntal works for the piano. He added a slow movement and finale to the 1841 Phantasie for piano and orchestra, to create his Piano Concerto, Op. 54. The following year he worked on what was to be published as his Second Symphony , Op. 61. Progress on
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#17327985839387502-557: The first movement of a symphony (it was too thinly orchestrated according to Wieck and was never completed). An additional activity was journalism. From March 1834, along with Wieck and others, he was on the editorial board of a new music magazine, Neue Leipziger Zeitschrift für Musik (New Leipzig Music Magazine), which was reconstituted under his sole editorship in January 1835 as the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik . Hall writes that it took "a thoughtful and progressive line on
7623-633: The four and is influenced by Beethoven and Schubert. The Third Symphony (1851), known as the Rhenish , is, unusually for a symphony of its day, in five movements, and is the composer's nearest approach to pictorial symphonic music, with movements depicting a solemn religious ceremony in Cologne Cathedral and outdoor merrymaking of Rhinelanders. Schumann experimented with unconventional symphonic forms in 1841 in his Overture, Scherzo and Finale , Op. 52, sometimes described as "a symphony without
7744-483: The genteel tradition which had dominated American art since the days of Hopkinson and Hewitt". In the 1970s, John Gillespie reaffirmed Chase's opinion by writing that MacDowell's place in time "accounts for his decreasing popularity; he does not belong with the great Romantics, Schumann and Brahms, but neither can be regarded as a precursor of twentieth century music". Other critics, such as Virgil Thomson , maintained that MacDowell's legacy would be reconsidered and regain
7865-552: The influence of Schumann's". The first movement pitches against each other the forthright Florestan and dreamy Eusebius elements in Schumann's artistic nature – the vigorous opening bars succeeded by the wistful A minor theme that enters in the fourth bar. No other concerto or concertante work by Schumann has approached the popularity of the Piano Concerto, but the Concert Piece for Four Horns and Orchestra (1849) and
7986-434: The instrumentation before conducting his orchestral music. The music scholar Julius Harrison considers such alterations fruitless: "the essence of Schumann's warmly vibrant music resides in its forthright romantic appeal with all those personal traits, lovable characteristic and faults" that make up Schumann's artistic character. Hall comments that Schumann's orchestration has subsequently been more highly regarded because of
8107-683: The ladies". The authors of The Record Guide describe Schumann as "one of the four supreme masters of the German Lied ", alongside Schubert, Brahms and Hugo Wolf . The pianist Gerald Moore wrote that "after the unparalleled Franz Schubert", Schumann shares the second place in the hierarchy of the Lied with Wolf. Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians classes Schumann as "the true heir of Schubert" in Lieder . Schumann wrote more than 300 songs for voice and piano. They are known for
8228-541: The later chamber works are the Sonata in A minor for Piano and Violin , Op. 105 – the first of three chamber pieces written in a two-month period of intense creativity in 1851 – followed by the Third Piano Trio and the Sonata in D minor for Violin and Piano , Op. 121. In addition to his chamber works for what were or were becoming standard combinations of instruments, Schumann wrote for some unusual groupings and
8349-702: The later years of the 1830s were marked by an unsuccessful attempt by Schumann to establish himself in Vienna, and a growing friendship with Mendelssohn, who was by then based in Leipzig, conducting the Gewandhaus Orchestra . During this period Schumann wrote many piano works, including Kreisleriana (1837), Davidsbündlertänze (1837), Kinderszenen (Scenes from Childhood, 1838) and Faschingsschwank aus Wien (Carnival Prank from Vienna, 1839). In 1838 Schumann visited Schubert's brother Ferdinand and discovered several manuscripts including that of
8470-419: The law as a career, he wrote to his mother on 30 July 1830 telling her how he saw his future: "My entire life has been a twenty-year struggle between poetry and prose, or call it music and law". He persuaded her to ask Wieck for an objective assessment of his musical potential. Wieck's verdict was that with the necessary hard work Schumann could become a leading pianist within three years. A six-month trial period
8591-560: The law as a profession. After his final examinations at the Lyceum in March 1828 he entered Leipzig University . Accounts differ about his diligence as a law student. According to his roommate Emil Flechsig [ de ] , he never set foot in a lecture hall, but he himself recorded, "I am industrious and regular, and enjoy my jurisprudence ... and am only now beginning to appreciate its true worth". Nonetheless reading and playing
8712-462: The link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Eight_Songs&oldid=884306265 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Edward Alexander MacDowell Edward Alexander MacDowell (December 18, 1860 – January 23, 1908)
8833-428: The mid-1840s), either because of his declining health, or because his increasingly orthodox approach to composition deprived his music of the Romantic spontaneity of the earlier works. The late-nineteenth century composer Felix Draeseke commented "Schumann started as a genius and ended as a talent". In the view of the composer and oboeist Heinz Holliger , "certain works of his early and middle period are praised to
8954-554: The mid-1990s smaller ensembles such as the Orchestre des Champs-Élysées with Philippe Herreweghe and the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique with John Eliot Gardiner have recorded historically informed readings of Schumann's orchestral music. The songs featured in the recorded repertoire from the early days of the gramophone, with performances by singers such as Elisabeth Schumann (no relation to
9075-500: The most popular Romantic piano concertos. In the mid-twentieth century, when the symphonies were less well regarded than they later became, the concerto was described in The Record Guide as "the one large-scale work of Schumann's which is by general consent an entire success". The pianist Susan Tomes comments, "In the era of recording it has often been paired with Grieg's Piano Concerto (also in A minor) which clearly shows
9196-423: The name of her home town, Asch . The Symphonic Studies are based on a melody said to be by Ernestine's father, Baron von Fricken, an amateur flautist. Schumann and Ernestine became secretly engaged, but in the view of the musical scholar Joan Chissell , during 1835 Schumann gradually found that Ernestine's personality was not as interesting to him as he first thought, and this, together with his discovery that she
9317-704: The new music of the day". Among the contributors were friends and colleagues of Schumann, writing under pen names: he included them in his Davidsbündler (League of David) – a band of fighters for musical truth, named after the Biblical hero who fought against the Philistines – a product of the composer's imagination in which, blurring the boundaries of imagination and reality, he included his musical friends. During successive months in 1835 Schumann met three musicians whom he regarded with particular respect: Felix Mendelssohn , Chopin and Moscheles. Of these, he
9438-491: The other a worldly realist – both in love with the same woman at a masked ball. Schumann had by now come to regard himself as having two distinct sides to his personality and art: he dubbed his introspective, pensive self "Eusebius" and the impetuous and dynamic alter ego "Florestan". Reviewing an early work of Chopin in 1831 he wrote: Schumann's pianistic ambitions were ended by a growing paralysis in at least one finger of his right hand. The early symptoms had come while he
9559-549: The piano occupied a good deal of his time, and he developed expensive tastes for champagne and cigars. Musically, he discovered the works of Franz Schubert , whose death in November 1828 caused Schumann to cry all night. The leading piano teacher in Leipzig was Friedrich Wieck , who recognised Schumann's talent and accepted him as a pupil. After a year in Leipzig Schumann convinced his mother that he should move to
9680-582: The piano. Stockhausen also gave the first complete performances of Frauenliebe und Leben and the Op. 24 Liederkreis . After his Liederjahr Schumann returned in earnest to writing songs after a break of several years. Hall describes the variety of the songs as immense, and comments that some of the later songs are entirely different in mood from the composer's earlier Romantic settings. Schumann's literary sensibilities led him to create in his songs an equal partnership between words and music unprecedented in
9801-593: The piece was not the success Schumann had been hoping for. In a 2005 study of the composer, Eric Frederick Jensen attributes this to Schumann's operatic style: "not tuneful and simplistic enough for the majority, not 'progressive' enough for the Wagnerians ". Franz Liszt , who was in the first-night audience, revived Genoveva at Weimar in 1855 – the only other production of the opera in Schumann's lifetime. Since then, according to Kobbé's Opera Book , despite occasional revivals Genoveva has remained "far from even
9922-422: The poetic was the main element. According to the musicologist Carl Dahlhaus , for Schumann, "music was supposed to turn into a tone poem , to rise above the realm of the trivial, of tonal mechanics, by means of its spirituality and soulfulness". In the late nineteenth century and most of the twentieth it was widely held that the music of Schumann's later years was less inspired than his earlier works (up to about
10043-504: The point where his removal became a necessity in 1853". During 1850 Schumann composed two substantial late works – the Third ( Rhenish ) Symphony and the Cello Concerto . He continued to compose prolifically, and reworked some of his earlier works, including the D minor symphony from 1841, published as his Fourth Symphony (1851), and the 1835 Symphonic Studies (1852). In 1853 the twenty-year-old Johannes Brahms called on Schumann with
10164-457: The production of its full effect, and its great and various difficulties make it the best possible test of a pianist's skill and versatility". Schumann continually inserted into his piano works veiled allusions to himself and others – particularly Clara – in the form of ciphers and musical quotations. His self-references include both the impetuous "Florestan" and the poetic "Eusebius" elements he identified in himself. Although some of his music
10285-460: The proposed marriage, but he was mistaken: Wieck refused his consent, fearing that Schumann would be unable to provide for his daughter, that she would have to abandon her career, and that she would be legally required to relinquish her inheritance to her husband. It took a series of acrimonious legal actions over the next four years for Schumann to obtain a court ruling that he and Clara were free to marry without her father's consent. Professionally
10406-409: The quality of the texts he set: Hall comments that the composer's youthful appreciation of literature was constantly renewed in adult life. Although Schumann greatly admired Goethe and Schiller and set a few of their verses, his favoured poets for lyrics were the later Romantics such as Heine , Eichendorff and Mörike . Among the best-known of the songs are those in four cycles composed in 1840 –
10527-459: The scene, many Americans felt that here at last was 'the great American composer' awaited by the nation. But MacDowell was not a great composer. At his best he was a gifted miniaturist with an individual manner. Creatively, he looked toward the past, not toward the future. He does not mark the beginning of a new epoch in American music, but the closing of a fading era, the fin de siecle decline of
10648-529: The skies, while on the other hand a pious veil of silence obscures the more sober, austere and concentrated works of the late period". More recently the later works have been viewed more favourably; Hall suggests that this is because they are now played more often in concert and in recording studios, and have "the beneficial effects of period performance practice as it has come to be applied to mid-19th-century music". Schumann's works in some other musical genres – particularly orchestral and operatic works – have had
10769-443: The soprano Giuditta Pasta ; he wrote to Wieck, "one can have no notion of Italian music without hearing it under Italian skies". Another influence on him was hearing the violin virtuoso Niccolò Paganini play in Frankfurt in April 1830. In the words of one biographer, "The easy-going discipline at Heidelberg University helped the world to lose a bad lawyer and to gain a great musician". Finally deciding in favour of music rather than
10890-465: The theme on which the variations are based. The use of a musical cryptogram became a recurrent characteristic of Schumann's later music. In 1831 he began lessons in harmony and counterpoint with Heinrich Dorn , musical director of the Saxon court theatre, and in 1832 he published his Op. 2, Papillons (Butterflies) for piano, a programmatic piece depicting twin brothers – one a poetic dreamer,
11011-540: The third section was successfully performed in Dresden, Leipzig and Weimar in 1849 to mark the centenary of Goethe's birth. Jensen comments that its good reception is surprising as Schumann made no concessions to popular taste: "The music is not particularly tuneful ... There are no arias for Faust or Gretchen in the grand manner". The complete work was first given in 1862 in Cologne , six years after Schumann's death. Schumann's other works for voice and orchestra include
11132-400: The time that MacDowell composed a piano piece titled Cradle Song , Marian suffered an illness that resulted in her being unable to bear children. In Germany, the MacDowells settled first in Frankfurt, then in Darmstadt , and finally, in Wiesbaden . From 1885 to 1888, MacDowell devoted himself almost exclusively to composition. That brought financial difficulties, and he decided to return to
11253-571: The time, writing for solo piano, voice and piano, chamber groups , orchestra, choir and the opera. His works typify the spirit of the Romantic era in German music. Schumann was born in Zwickau , Saxony, to an affluent middle-class family with no musical connections, and was initially unsure whether to pursue a career as a lawyer or to make a living as a pianist-composer. He studied law at the universities of Leipzig and Heidelberg but his main interests were music and Romantic literature . From 1829 he
11374-399: The work was slow, interrupted by further bouts of ill health. When the symphony was complete he began work on his opera, Genoveva , which was not completed until August 1848. Between 24 November 1846 and 4 February 1847 the Schumanns toured to Vienna, Berlin and other cities. The Viennese leg of the tour was not a success. The performance of Schumann's First Symphony and Piano Concerto at
11495-400: The work with a preconceived idea of what an opera must be like, and finding that Genoveva did not match their preconceptions they condemned it out of hand. In Harnoncourt's view it is a mistake to look for a dramatic plot in this opera: Harnoncourt's view of the lack of drama in the opera contrasts with that of Victoria Bond , who conducted the work's first professional stage production in
11616-480: The year a second symphony was premiered and was less enthusiastically received. Schumann revised it ten years later and published it as his Fourth Symphony . Brahms preferred the original, more lightly-scored version, which is occasionally performed and has been recorded, but the revised 1851 score is more usually played. The work now called the Second Symphony (1846) is structurally the most classical of
11737-412: Was a co-founder of the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik (New Musical Journal) in 1834 and edited it for ten years. In his writing for the journal and in his music he distinguished between two contrasting aspects of his personality, dubbing these alter egos "Florestan" for his impetuous self and "Eusebius" for his gentle poetic side. Despite the bitter opposition of Wieck, who did not regard his pupil as
11858-420: Was a setback to Schumann's career: he had a severe and debilitating mental crisis. This was not the first such attack, although it was the worst so far. Hall writes that he had been subject to similar attacks at intervals over a long period, and comments that the condition may have been congenital, affecting August Schumann and Emilie, the composer's sister. Later in the year, Schumann, having recovered, completed
11979-519: Was a student of the piano teacher Friedrich Wieck , but his hopes for a career as a virtuoso pianist were frustrated by a worsening problem with his right hand, and he concentrated on composition. His early works were mainly piano pieces, including the large-scale Carnaval , Davidsbündlertänze (Dances of the League of David), Fantasiestücke (Fantasy Pieces), Kreisleriana and Kinderszenen (Scenes from Childhood) (1834–1838). He
12100-543: Was admitted to the Paris Conservatory after receiving a competitive scholarship for international students. After two years of studies under Antoine François Marmontel and being at the top of his class, he continued his education at Dr. Hoch's Conservatory in Frankfurt , Germany, where he studied piano with Carl Heymann and composition with Joachim Raff . When Franz Liszt and Clara Schumann visited
12221-420: Was agreed. Later in 1830 Schumann published his Op. 1, a set of piano variations on a theme based on the name of its supposed dedicatee, Countess Pauline von Abegg (who was almost certainly a product of Schumann's imagination). The notes A-B♭-E-G-G (A-B-E-G-G in German nomenclature, which uses "B" for the note known elsewhere as B♭ and "H" for the note known elsewhere as B[♮]), played in waltz tempo, make up
12342-586: Was also a major influence on the Russian school of composers, including Anton Rubinstein and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky . Robert Schumann was born in Zwickau , in the Kingdom of Saxony (today the German state of Saxony ), into an affluent middle-class family. On 13 June 1810 the local newspaper, the Zwickauer Wochenblatt (Zwickau Weekly Paper), carried the announcement, "On 8 June to Herr August Schumann , notable citizen and bookseller here,
12463-417: Was also a noted teacher of the piano and music composition. His students included James Dunn , E. Ray Goetz , Frances Tarbox and John Pierce Langs , a student from Buffalo, New York , with whom he became very close friends. Langs was also close to noted Canadian pianist Harold Bradley , and both championed MacDowell's piano compositions. The linguist Edward Sapir was also among his students. MacDowell
12584-481: Was an American composer and pianist of the late Romantic period . He was best known for his second piano concerto and his piano suites Woodland Sketches , Sea Pieces and New England Idylls . Woodland Sketches includes his most popular short piece, " To a Wild Rose ". In 1904 he was one of the first seven Americans honored by membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters . Edward MacDowell
12705-441: Was an illegitimate, impecunious, adopted daughter of Fricken, brought the affair to a gradual end. According to the biographer Alan Walker , Ernestine may have been less than frank with Schumann about her background and he was hurt when he learnt the truth. Schumann felt a growing attraction to Wieck's daughter, the sixteen-year-old Clara . She was her father's star pupil, a piano virtuoso emotionally mature beyond her years, with
12826-590: Was born in New York City to Thomas MacDowell, a Manhattan milk dealer, and Frances "Fanny" Mary Knapp. He received his first piano lessons from Juan Buitrago, a Colombian violinist who was living with the MacDowell family at the time. He also received music lessons from friends of Buitrago, including the Cuban pianist Pablo Desverine and Venezuelan pianist and composer Teresa Carreño . MacDowell's mother decided to take her son to Paris, France, where in 1877 he
12947-521: Was elected as the president of the Society of American Musicians and Composers (New York). In 1904, he became one of the first seven people chosen for membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters . After this experience, the MacDowells envisioned establishing a residency for artists near their summer home in Peterborough, New Hampshire . The MacDowell (artists' residency and workshop) ,
13068-663: Was in contrast with earlier piano quintets with different combinations of instruments, such as Schubert's Trout Quintet (1819). Schumann's ensemble became the template for later composers including Brahms, Franck , Fauré , Dvořák and Elgar . Roesner describes the Quartet as equally brilliant as the Quintet but also more intimate. Schumann composed a set of three string quartets (Op. 41, 1842). Dahlhaus comments that after this Schumann avoided writing for string quartet, finding Beethoven's achievements in that genre daunting. Among
13189-547: Was likely to distress all concerned and reduce the chances of recovery. Friends, including Brahms and Joachim, were permitted to visit Schumann but Clara did not see her husband until nearly two and a half years into his confinement, and only two days before his death. Schumann died at the sanatorium aged 46 on 29 July 1856, the cause of death being recorded as pneumonia . Baker's Biographical Dictionary of Musicians (2001) begins its entry on Schumann: "[G]reat German composer of surpassing imaginative power whose music expressed
13310-526: Was most influenced in his compositions by Mendelssohn, although the latter's restrained classicism is reflected in Schumann's later works rather than in those of the 1830s. Early in 1835 he completed two substantial compositions: Carnaval , Op. 9 and the Symphonic Studies , Op.13. These works grew out of his romantic relationship with Ernestine von Fricken [ de ] , a fellow pupil of Wieck. The musical themes of Carnaval derive from
13431-404: Was not a great success in Schumann's lifetime and has continued to be a rarity in the opera house. From its premiere onwards the work was criticised on the grounds that it is "an evening of Lieder and nothing much else happens". The conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt , who championed the work, blamed music critics for the low esteem in which the work is held. He maintained that they all approached
13552-401: Was not particularly musical but he encouraged his son's interest in music, buying him a Streicher grand piano and organising trips to Leipzig for a performance of Die Zauberflöte (The Magic Flute) and Carlsbad to hear the celebrated pianist Ignaz Moscheles . August Schumann died in 1826; his widow was less enthusiastic about a musical career for her son and persuaded him to study for
13673-481: Was often flexible about which instruments a work called for: in his Adagio and Allegro , Op. 70 the pianist may, according to the composer, be joined by either a horn, a violin or a cello, and in the Fantasiestücke , Op. 73 the pianist may be duetting with a clarinet, violin or cello. His Andante and Variations (1843) for two pianos, two cellos and a horn later became a piece for just the pianos. Genoveva
13794-404: Was often stressed in his position at Columbia University, due to both administrative duties and growing conflict with the new university president Nicholas Murray Butler around a proposed two-course requirement in fine arts for all undergraduate students, as well as creation of combined Department of Fine Arts overseeing music, sculpture, painting and comparative literature. After Butler stripped
13915-455: Was one of five American composers honored in a series of United States postage stamps. The other four composers were Stephen Foster , John Philip Sousa , Victor Herbert , and Ethelbert Nevin . However, as the twentieth century progressed, his fame was eclipsed by such American composers as Charles Ives , Aaron Copland , and Roy Harris . In 1950s, Gilbert Chase , an American music historian and critic, wrote, "When Edward MacDowell appeared on
14036-532: Was personally invited to Columbia University by its president Seth Low to create a music department. He stayed at Columbia until 1904. In addition to composing and teaching, from 1896 to 1898 he directed the Mendelssohn Glee Club . MacDowell composed some music for the group to perform. In 1896, Marian MacDowell purchased Hillcrest Farm, to serve as their summer residence in Peterborough, New Hampshire . MacDowell found his creativity flourished in
14157-647: Was premiered by Mendelssohn at a concert in the Gewandhaus at which Clara played Chopin's Second Piano Concerto and some of Schumann's works for solo piano. His next orchestral works were the Overture, Scherzo and Finale , the Phantasie for piano and orchestra (which later became the first movement of the Piano Concerto ) and a new symphony (eventually published as the Fourth, in D minor ). Clara gave birth to
14278-407: Was rescued by fishermen, and at his own request he was admitted to a private sanatorium at Endenich , near Bonn , on 4 March. He remained there for more than two years, gradually deteriorating, with intermittent intervals of lucidity during which he wrote and received letters and sometimes essayed some composition. The director of the sanatorium held that direct contact between patients and relatives
14399-475: Was still a student at Heidelberg, and the cause is uncertain. He tried all the treatments then in vogue including allopathy , homeopathy , and electric therapy, but without success. The condition had the advantage of exempting him from compulsory military service – he could not fire a rifle – but by 1832 he recognised that a career as a virtuoso pianist was impossible and he shifted his main focus to composition. He completed further sets of small piano pieces and
14520-419: Was stronger in his praise of Mozart: "Serenity, repose, grace, the characteristics of the antique works of art, are also those of Mozart's school. The Greeks gave to 'The Thunderer' a radiant expression, and radiantly does Mozart launch his lightnings". After his studies Schumann produced three string quartets, a Piano Quintet (premiered in 1843) and a Piano Quartet (premiered in 1844). In early 1843 there
14641-399: Was the most popular piece he ever wrote, it was performed endlessly. Every composer loved it. Wagner wrote how jealous he was that Schumann had done it". Based on an episode from Thomas Moore 's epic poem Lalla Rookh it reflects the exotic, colourful tales from Persian mythology popular in the nineteenth century. In a letter to a friend in 1843 Schumann said, "at the moment I'm involved in
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