The first three movements of Schumann’s F-sharp minor sonata, Op. 11, set the scene of a composer at odds with the genre he is writing in. The fascinating results that arise therefrom—an almost Wagnerian obsession with a held single note—carries immense significance for the narrative of the work as a whole. Thus, the three movements […]

Schumann’s musical output in general, and his early works in particular, contain a fascinating mix of the traditional and the innovative. On one hand, he was staunchly true to the traditions of harmony and counterpoint he inherited from the great composers who came before him, but on the other hand, he seemed to be just […]