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Donald Macleod unpacks Schumann’s early steps and missteps in love, around the time he composed his popular piano work Carnaval.

Robert Schumann’s early training was focused towards his ambition to become a celebrated concert pianist, but a hand injury quickly put that career option out of reach. Schumann turned instead to composition and put all that piano study to good use, writing many important works for his own instrument. This week, Composer of the Week unpacks the moments in Schumann life when he was creating some of his most famous and notable piano works, including one of the most iconic Romantic pianos concertos of all time.

As Robert Schumann became increasingly aware that his playing career would fail to flower, his focus turned towards writing music. To launch himself as a composer of orchestral music he produced his Zwickau Symphony, which was reviewed as being highly artistic but also very difficult. Within a few years, Schumann found better success with one of his most popular works for solo piano, Carnaval, inspired by his intense feelings for Ernestine von Fricken, with whom he had become engaged.

So wahr die Sonne scheinet, Op 37 No 12 (from Zwölf Gedichte aus Liebesfrüling)
Juliane Banse, soprano
Olaf Bär, bass-baritone
Helmut Deutsch, piano

Symphony in G minor, Woo29 (Zwickau)
Orchestre Revolutionnaire et Romantique
John Eliot Gardiner, conductor

Allegro in B minor, Op 8
Eric Le Sage, piano

Carnaval, Op 9
Evgeny Kissin, piano

Produced by Luke Whitlock, for ´óÏó´«Ã½ Wales