Clara Schumann

8 Pages 2113 Words

rianne, taught piano, also. She was an accomplished singer, and had begun performing in public while still a teenager. She sang frequently at the Gewandhaus, the most important concert hall in Leipzig. Marianne was a former student of Frederick’s. He had always admired her musical talent, but their shared interest in music was not the only reason he had married her. He knew that Marianne’s success as a singer and pianist would bring him new students, also attracting new customers to his piano store. Under Frederick’s watchful eye, Marianne kept a busy schedule of teaching and performing, even though she was almost constantly pregnant. In seven years, she gave birth to five children. Only three of the children survived: Clara, and her younger brothers Alvin and Gustav. Fortunately, Frederick agreed to hire nursemaids and nannies to help with the children. In the nineteenth century, even piano teachers could afford live-in servants, because servants were paid only pennies a day. However, even music could not make Frederick and Marianne’s marriage a happy one. Frederick was talented and intelligent, but he could also be demanding, controlling, and stubborn. He often lost patience with Marianne and the children, and easily flew into screaming rages.
The strain in Marianne and Frederick’s marriage had a powerful and unusual effect on their only daughter: Clara did not speak a single word until she was over four years old, and then she spoke with difficulty. It seemed as if she couldn’t hear or understand words. Some people even thought she was deaf or mentally retarded since she spoke so little, and seemed uninterested in what was going on ...