C. Schumann, Piano Concerto in A minor [Breit:EB9582]

In the fall of 1833, Friedrich Wieck confidently announced his daughter's new composition: “She is now writing a great Concerto that will attract the attention of connoisseurs”. Clara Schumann, then still Clara Wieck, was 14 years old. She had been performing as a piano virtuoso since she was nine years old, and the “attention of connoisseurs” was indeed assured for her. However, her Concerto for Piano and Orchestra op. 7 was not completed in its entirety until two years later. At the premiere on 9 November 1835 in the Leipzig Gewandhaus, under the direction of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, Clara Wieck herself played the piano part.

“Clara Wieck's knowledge of performance practice and reality determines the concept of the Concerto op. 7, which reflects the virtuoso's art as well as the young composer's self-confident, unconventional attitude,” writes editor Dr. Janina Klassen in the preface to the revised edition. On the composer's 200th birthday in 2019, her opus 7 experienced a veritable renaissance that continues to this day.