Despite their occasional marital difficulties and the deeper troubles brought on by Robert's mental illness, Robert and Clara Schumann were one of the most devoted couples in musical history, and one of the few such marriages where the two partners were of roughly equal stature, though in different areas. This set contains songs written by both of them. Schumann wrote his nine songs in January, and Clara her three in June, and Schumann arranged for his publishers to release them in September as a birthday surprise for her.

Robert's songs, especially, are filled with hidden musical messages. In the first, describing a tear that Heaven wept into the sea and which was enclosed by a mussel to transform it into a pearl, the famous "Clara" theme appears in the bass, as if describing her as a pearl coming from a tear, and there is also a brief quotation from Giordani's song, "Caro mio ben" (a love song that declares, "My dear love, without you, my heart mourns"), another private message to Clara. Though perhaps not a direct message or reference, since he often skillfully used piano postludes (most notably in Frauenliebe und -Leben), some of his most imaginative and effective writing is in the postludes to these pieces, such as the strangely agitated ending to "Flugel! Flugel!" or the nightingale's song which ends "O ihr Herren." Like many of Schumann's later song cycles, such as the Minnespiel aus Ruckerts Liebesfruhling of 1849, it combines solo songs and combinations of voices: here, a modest two duets (the seventh and the last song). Again, while two vocal lines was a device Robert used often, it might have had a special meaning for the Schumanns in this set.

It is not easy to distinguish between Clara's and Robert's writing, unless the listener knows beforehand which are whose. Some scholars say that this shows that Robert must have helped her with hers, others that it shows she might have been as great a song composer as he.

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1.Der Himmel hat eine Träne geweint

Rückert's little sea dwelling mussel piously welcomes a celestial tear into its heart in Robert Schumann's "Der Himmel hat eine Träne geweint," Op. 37/1 (From Heaven Once Fell a Tear). Written in A flat major, the slow sustained song draws on the notes of one of Clara Schumann's inventions and of "So wahr die Sonne scheinet," Op. 37/12, also of Gedichte aus "Liebesfrühling," Op. 37. The two verses of Op. 37/1 share a few melodic similarities and both conclude with ritardandos; however, the second verse is considerably louder and contains more dynamic markings to express the text's increasingly emotional sentiment. After the opening motif solemnly reappears at the midpoint, the tone grows heavier as the mollusk's declaration becomes prayer-like. The piano part has the license to luxuriously and poetically caress each note of the brief four-bar postlude. Following the work's completion, Robert and Clara Schumann had the pleasure of hearing Jenny Lind give a superb performance of the simple song.

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