Why would any self-respecting woman perform Schumannâs Frauenliebe und leben?
Schumannâs song cycle seems to have little to say about the realities of a womanâs life, but its emotional depths and the musicâs sheer beauty still touch us. Carolyn Sampson explains how her new recording gives its passive heroine a little more life
New context: pianist Joseph Middleton and soprano Carolyn Sampson Photograph: Andy Staples
New context: pianist Joseph Middleton and soprano Carolyn Sampson Photograph: Andy Staples
CarolynSampson
Tue 13 Apr 2021 06.11 EDT
Last modified on Tue 13 Apr 2021 09.48 EDT
Robert Schumannâs Frauenliebe und -leben is a song cycle that depicts, in eight poems, a womanâs love and life. Its texts, poems by Adelbert von Chamisso, sum up a womanâs life roughly as: 1. I canât think of anything but him; 2. Heâs wonderful and I am not worthy; 3. OMG â he said he loved me; 4. I am his and have the ring to prove it; 5. Gi