Clara – Sheet Music

“Clara” is a work exploring the life of Clara Schumann, using diary entries and letters from Clara as the basis of the work, and was written on Making Music’s Adopt-A-Composer Scheme 2018/19. The first movement explores her feelings around composition, the joy and love for it being contradicted by self-doubt and misogynistic ideas around creativity.  The second movement considers Clara’s great successes as a travelling concert pianist performing for royalty across the continent, with the work ending in a reflection of Clara’s personality, story and life experiences in a setting of the poem “Faithful Diary” by Di de Woolfson. The work was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in January 2020.

Considerations for Performance:

The work includes German and English so time is needed to familiarise with the German text and how to combine with the English.  In addition there are also moments of improvisation in the piece, and these should be treated as freely and creatively as possible.

You can hear the whole piece being performed on SoundCloud here.  The whole of the first movement is also available here

Other useful links:

Getting to know Clara Schumann

Making Music Blog – ‘Faithful Diary’ – a collaboration between poet and composer

Making Music Blog – ‘A Woman Must Not Desire To Compose’