Robert Schumann was just eighteen when he wrote these three songs to poems by Justinus Kerner, whom he nearly worshipped as a young man and from whose texts he created many of his later compositions, and he sent them to a prominent Braunschweig composer, Gottlob Wiedebein (a composer who now has been almost completely overshadowed by Schumann and Schubert). Wiedebein responded very graciously, commending Schumann's natural talent, and assuring him that while the songs had their flaws, mainly an uncertain grasp of the principles of composition, these were flaws that experience and study could correct. Schumann was ecstatic at this reply, and in an effusive thank-you letter, said that he had previously followed only his instinct and nature, but now he was determined to become a serious musician, and would earnestly study those exact principles. (His response was typically dramatic and Romantic: "The knife of the intellect will sternly scrape away all that wild fantasy might try to smuggle in.")

Wiedebein's assessment was an accurate one; the songs have a lyrical appeal that makes their lack of sophistication seem an indicator of youth and still-budding aptitude rather than crudity. Schumann himself never published them; after his death, Brahms, who had been a protégé of both Robert and Clara Schumann, published them, as a supplemental volume rather than as part of the complete edition of Schumann's works.

© All Music Guide

Portions of Content Provided by All Music Guide.
© 2008 All Media Guide, LLC. All Music Guide is a registered trademark of All Media Guide, LLC.