Fantasiestücke Op.12

Des Abends (In the evening)

Aufschwung (Soaring)

Warum? (Why?)

Grillen (Whims)

In der Nacht (In the Night)

Fabel (Fable)

Traumes-Wirren (Dream Visions)

Ende vom Lied (End of the Song)

The Fantasiestücke Op.12 are dedicated, intriguingly, to Anna Robena Laidlaw - a gifted and attractive British pianist who visited Leipzig in 1837 and with whom, it has been suggested, Schumann might have found some consolation for his then strictly enforced separation from Clara Wieck. Whatever the nature of his relationship with Ms Laidlaw, the thematic identity of the first piece in the collection, Des Abends, gives a clear indication that Clara was still very much on the composer’s mind: the stepwise descending line delicately traced by the right hand in the opening bars is one of many variants of a melodic message Robert and Clara both understood. Its introduction here is all the more poignant for the insecurity of its apparently triple-time rhythms in a basically duple-time metre and two unlikely modulations from D flat major to E major.

Aufschwung is as impulsive as Des Abends is dreamy. While the contrast is compounded by the strict rondo form applied to the second piece, Schumann retains a link with the first by including comparatively lyrical episodes in D flat and B flat major within an urgent F minor context. There is a similar contrast between the tender Warum? in D flat major - a harmonically inspired reminder that Chopin had made a memorable visit to Leipzig in 1836 - and the intermittently gruff but mainly good-humoured Grillen in the same key.

In der Nacht is a miniature tone poem said to be based on the story of Hero and Leander - or Clara and Robert separated by the Hellespont of her father’s implacable hostility to any relationship between them. Certainly, there is a palpable sense of a struggle against the elements in the F minor outer sections which surge round and occasionally intrude on the vulnerably expressive middle section in F major. The fifth movement of what was originally to have been a nine-movement construction, it is so central to Schumann’s thinking that it definitively shifts the tonality from D flat to F. After Fabel, which alternates poetic reflection with animated activity in C major, Traumes-Wirren offers innocently virtuoso outer sections in F major round a strategically placed D flat major middle section, neatly reversing the harmonic relationship prevalent in the first half of the work. Ende vom Lied celebrates the new situation with a sturdy march in F major - but only to be beset by last-minute doubts which are no more than tentatively resolved in a hesitant and brooding coda.

Des Abends (In the evening)

Aufschwung (Soaring)

Warum? (Why?)

Grillen (Whims)

In der Nacht (In the Night)

Fabel (Fable)

Traumes–Wirren (Dream Visions)

Ende vom Lied (End of the Song)

For Schumann “Fantasie” – which appears in as many as ten of his titles between 1837 and 1853 – was a term with significant reverberations. It reminded him, for example, of the improvisatory pieces of one of his musical heroes, J.S. Bach, and it was associated too with the fanciful fictions of one of his favourite writers, E.T.A. Hoffmann. While it is unlikely that the Fantasiestücke Op.12 were directly inspired by Hoffmann’s Fantasiestücke in Callots Manier, the idea of compiling a suite of short, sharply contrasted “Fantasie” pieces – as distinct from the large–scale Fantasie in C major that he had begun in 1836 and had still not finished a year later – might well have derived from that erratic collection.

Written in 1837, the Fantasiestücke Op.12 were dedicated on their publication in 1838 to Anna Robena Laidlaw, a gifted and attractive British pianist who had visited Leipzig in 1837 and with whom, it has been suggested, Schumann might have found some consolation for his then strictly enforced separation from Clara Wieck. Whatever the nature of his relationship with Ms Laidlaw, the thematic identity of the first piece in the collection, Des Abends, gives a clear indication that Clara was still very much on the composer’s mind: the stepwise descending line delicately traced by the right hand in the opening bars is one of many variants of a melodic message Robert and Clara both understood. Its introduction here is all the more poignant for the insecurity of its apparently triple-time rhythms in a basically duple–time metre and its two modulations from D flat major to an unlikely E major.

In accordance with the “Eusebius” and “Florestan” duality consciously cultivated by Schumann in both his critical writings and his music at this time, Aufschwung is as impulsive as Des Abends is dreamy. Although the contrast is compounded by the strict rondo form applied to the second piece, Schumann retains a link between them by including comparatively lyrical episodes in D flat and B flat major within an urgent F minor context. There is a similar contrast between the tender Warum? in D flat major – a harmonically inspired reminder that Chopin had made a memorable visit to Leipzig in 1836 – and the intermittently gruff but mainly good–humoured Grillen in the same key.

In der Nacht is a miniature tone poem said to be based on the story of Hero and Leander. O it could be Clara and Robert separated by the Hellespont of her father’s implacable hostility to any relationship between them. Certainly, there is a palpable sense of a struggle against the elements in the F minor outer sections which surge round and occasionally intrude on the vulnerably expressive middle section in F major. The prominent presence of the stepwise descending motif is a sure indication of the identity of the unhappy protagonists.

In fact, In der Nacht – the fifth movement of what was originally to have been a nine–movement construction – is so central to Schumann’s thinking that it definitively shifts the tonality from D flat to F. After Fabel, which alternates poetic reflection with animated activity in C major, Traumes–Wirren offers innocently virtuoso outer sections in F major round a strategically placed D flat major middle section, neatly reversing the harmonic relationship prevalent in the first half of the work. Ende vom Lied celebrates the new situation with a sturdy march in F major – but only to be beset by last–minute doubts which are no more than tentatively resolved in a hesitant and brooding coda.