Clara Schumann for kids: her life, her music, and what to play first

Clara Schumann was a German pianist and composer who lived from 1819 to 1896. She played her first big concert at nine and went on playing in public for more than 60 years. She was one of the best-known pianists in Europe. She also wrote music, taught, and raised eight children. The best first piece for a child is the first of her Three Romances for violin and piano.

Quick facts

• Born: 1819, in Leipzig, Germany
• Died: 1896, in Frankfurt, Germany
• Era: Romantic
• Played: piano
• Known for: a long concert career, a piano concerto, a piano trio, and songs

The life in short

Clara was born Clara Wieck. Her father was a piano teacher, and he planned her training from the start. She had a lesson every day and practiced for hours.

At nine, she played in the main concert hall of Leipzig. By her teens, she was touring Europe. She began her Piano Concerto at 13 and played the solo part at its first performance when she was 16. Felix Mendelssohn conducted.

A young composer named Robert Schumann came to study with her father. Clara and Robert fell in love. Her father was against the match, and the two had to go to court to win the right to marry. They married in 1840, the day before she turned 21.

Clara and Robert had eight children. She kept giving concerts, and she played Robert’s new music for audiences across Europe.

Robert became ill and died in 1856. Clara was 36. She supported her family by performing and teaching for more than 30 years. The composer Johannes Brahms was her close friend for the rest of her life. Read his story in Brahms for kids.

What made her concerts different

In Clara’s time, pianists often filled their concerts with showy pieces of their own. Clara chose music by Bach, Beethoven, Chopin, and her husband. She helped shape the kind of piano concert people still go to.

She was also one of the first pianists to play whole concerts from memory, with no music on the stand.

What the music sounds like

Clara’s own music is warm and songlike. The piano parts are rich, because she wrote them for her own hands.

She wrote most of her music before she was 37. After Robert died, she composed little and gave her time to performing, teaching, and preparing his music for print.

Three pieces to play first

Three Romances for violin and piano. The violin sings a long, tender tune, and the piano answers. The first romance is about three minutes long. She wrote the set for a violinist friend, and the two of them played it for a king.

Piano Trio in G minor. A piano, a violin, and a cello trade one tune from player to player. Try the third movement, which is slow and calm.

Piano Concerto in A minor. She wrote it as a teenager. In the slow middle part, the orchestra stops, and the piano plays a duet with one solo cello.

Things to do together

Call and answer. Play the first romance. Ask your child to point to one side when the violin has the tune and to the other when the piano answers.

Play from memory. Pick a short song your child knows by heart, and have them sing or play it with eyes closed. Talk about how Clara did this for a whole evening.

Count the years. Clara played in public from age nine to past 70. Find her on the composer timeline and see which composers were alive during her career.

Print and play

Print the Clara Schumann fact sheet. It has the story, three pieces, and room to write and draw.

Next, meet another woman who composed in the same years in Fanny Mendelssohn for kids. For all 24 composers by era, see classical composers for kids.