Tales from the Stave

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Series that tracks down the stories behind the scores of well-known pieces of music

Tales from the Stave: Robert Schumann - Frauenliebe und Leben

Robert Schumann - Frauenliebe und Leben

BBC Radio 4 - Tales from the Stave, Robert Schumann - Frauenliebe und Leben

Clemency Burton Hill presents the series celebrating priceless music manuscripts.

Clemency Burton Hill and her team explore the manuscript and sketches of Robert Schumann's song cycle about love and loss - Frauenliebe und Leben.

Robert Schumann's setting of poems by Adelbert von Chamisso, Frauenliebe und Leben, is a controversial concert choice in a post 'me-too' era.  A male poet and male composer giving voice to a female narrator who describes her adulation for a man, her blossoming love, sex and ultimately sense of abject loss is tricky for any self-respecting female performer.  But the craft and skill of the composing, the relationship Schumann had with his brilliant young wife Clara and the way that is reflected in the manuscript and the music is at the heart of this episode of Tales from the Stave.
Clemency is joined by Sopranos Naomi Louisa O'Connell and Alla Kravchuk along with pianist Brent Funderburk and the Juilliard professor Michael Griffel who explore the corrected copyists manuscript and the more extraordinary sketches made over two days, in which Schumann set down a clear vision of the full eight song cycle..

Producer:  Tom Alban

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Tales from the Stave

Robert Schumann - Frauenliebe und Leben

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