Classical Music | Piano Music

Recorded on 12/16/2015, uploaded on 07/24/2016

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

The first several years of Schumann's output as a composer was dominated exclusively by the piano. Following the lead of Chopin (whom Schumann greatly admired) and his op. 10 Études, Schumann set out to compose his own set of study pieces for the piano.

Known today as the Symphoniques Études (or, “Symphonic Etudes”), the collection has had a rather interesting genesis and history. It was begun in 1834 as a set of sixteen variations on a theme by Baron von Fricken. The baron was an amateur musician and also the guardian of Ernestine von Fricken, whom Schumann was engaged to in 1834 before breaking it off the following year. Concluding the original set of etudes was a solitary variation on the tune Du stolzes England freue dich (“Proud England, rejoice!”) from Henrich Marschner's opera based on Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe.

Of the original sixteen variations on Fricken's theme, only eleven were published in 1837, along with the Marschner variation under the title of XII Symphoniques Études. Oddly, though, only nine movements were explicitly indicated as variations. Later, in 1852, Schumann published a second edition of the work. In it he eliminated the third and ninth etudes (the two not labeled as variations in the first edition) and made revisions to the piano writing. This edition appeared under the title of  Études en forme de variationes. Both editions were dedicated to Schumman's friend and English pianist  William Sterndale Bennet. Bennet performed the work in England to much success, though Schumann never thought the work entirely appropriate for the concert stage.

Five years after Schumann's death, a third edition of the work was published by his father-in-law, Friedrich Wieck. In 1890, Schumann's Études were once again republished. In this edition, Johannes Brahms restored the five variations cut by Schumman, now known as the “posthumous” variations. Today, these variations are often included in performances, though their exact placement often varies.     Joseph DuBose

_________________________________________

Études Symphoniques, Op. 13 with Five Posthumous Études Restored by Brahms       Robert Schumann

The title communicates both Schumann’s symphonic approach to the piano and the technical difficulty of the études. Over the course of the work, its themes transform in a symphonic fashion, a process that is also related to expanded variations. It crystallized Schumann’s unusual and original approach to variation technique, which first manifested itself in Papillons, Op. 2 and Carnaval, Op. 9.

When the piece was first published in 1837, Schumann assigned the title Études symphoniques.  Fifteen years later he revised it, deleting two variations, rewriting the finale, and altering the title to Études en forme de variations. Five other discarded variations and an incomplete sixth further complicate the history of this work. (Johannes Brahms salvaged them after Schumann’s death.)

As is frequently the case with Schumann’s piano works, there is an autobiographical connection. He met Ernestine von Fricken in April 1834 and was soon smitten; the couple were secretly engaged for a brief period in the autumn of 1834. Ernestine’s father, Baron von Fricken, was an amateur flutist who dabbled in composition and sent Schumann a set of variations in the summer. Schumann ended up using von Fricken’s theme for the Variations. The theme for the triumphal march of the finale comes from “Der Templar und die Jüdin,” an opera by Marschner. The finale presents Schumann at his most exuberant and optimistic. His writing is spontaneous, imaginative, and rhythmically vibrant.     Notes by Laurie Shulman