Henle, Günter Robert Schumann - Carnaval op. 9

Schumann’s turbulent love-affair with the barely eighteen-year-old Ernestine von Fricken, though strong enough to lead to a secret engagement, lasted only a few months. Nevertheless, it managed to give rise to one of his most frequently played compositions: Carnaval. Some of these twenty-one character pieces are named after figures from the commedia dell’arte; others after such fictitious creations as Florestan and Eusebius, in which Schumann acknowledges his own split personality. The mysterious way that these figures relate to specific people in Schumann’s surroundings – and the deeper significance of the recurring motifs Ab-C-B and A-Eb-C-B – are explained in the editor’s detailed commentary in this revised new edition. ...