Clara Schumann

Soirees Musicales Op. 6

Clara Schumann (1819-1896), then Clara Wieck, wrote this collection of six Soirées musicales in 1835-1836, when she 16 or 17 years old. Reflecting the influence of Mendelssohn and Chopin, each melodic piece shows her clear understanding of the formal and harmonic tendencies of those two master composers. Her later husband Robert Schumann would say of Clara's Soirées musicales as boasting a "wealth of unconventional resources, an ability to entangle the secret, more deeply twisting threads and then to unravel them." Movements: 1. Toccatina, 2. Notturno, 3. Mazurka in G minor, 4. Ballade, 5. Mazurka in G major, 6. Polonaise.