Kinderszenen, Op. 15

The melody leaps from B to G and comes down F♯–E–D. Under it, triplets pass between the hands while the bass moves in two beats to the bar.

The opening eight bars are repeated. The melody again reaches the high G. Beneath it, a B♭ appears in the triplet accompaniment of bars 1 and 3 before the harmony returns to G major.

In 1847 Schumann gave the manuscript of this piece to his sister-in-law Marie Wieck. It is now in the Robert-⁠Schumann-⁠Haus in Zwickau and is the only complete autograph of any of the thirteen Kinderszenen.

An upbeat and two quick grace notes are followed by a short, clipped figure. Small rests break up the D major tune. At the end of each eight-bar phrase, both hands run upwards together.

Four quieter bars follow. The tune moves in even quavers over a walking bass, in G major. The clipped opening figure then returns, still marked piano.

Writing to Clara Wieck in March 1838, Schumann listed A Curious Story among his new pieces. “You will enjoy them,” he told her, “though of course you must forget yourself as a virtuoso.” He had chosen about twelve from thirty little pieces; thirteen reached print.

Each short phrase begins sforzando-piano, a sharp accent followed at once by a soft dynamic. The semiquavers run up and down under staccato dots. The left hand plays short chords and descending semiquaver runs of its own.

The second part carries the same running figure onto G–B–D harmony at bar 9. In the slurred bars 13–⁠16 the upper notes are held while the left hand climbs by semitones into bar 17. The opening chase then starts again.

On 18 January 1853 Marie Wieck, Clara’s younger half-sister, played six of the Kinderszenen. She placed Schumann’s third piece last on the programme.

The melody leaps up from B and falls back through G–F♯–E. Semiquavers fill the spaces beneath it, and the bass rests after each note. The two-bar phrase is played twice, first piano and then pianissimo.

In Vienna on 13 March 1839 Schumann inscribed an early copy of Kinderszenen “to F. Liszt in friendship”. Above Pleading Child he added a tempo direction by hand: Langsam (slowly).

The piece ends in bar 17 on a dominant seventh chord, A–C♯–E–G, held under a fermata. The chord does not resolve to D.

The melody rises, falls and breaks off on short rests. Semiquavers run underneath, and at times the left hand plays its own rising phrase. Schumann marks the whole opening piano.

A B♭ changes the direction of the tune. Over C in the bass, it forms a dominant-seventh chord, C–E–G–B♭, in bar 17, which resolves to F major in bar 18. The semiquavers continue without a break.

The bass rises by semitones while the melody descends. A final ritardando slows the running notes to a cadence in D major.

The piece is in three beats to the bar, marked forte, with accents over thick chords and octaves in the left hand. In bar 6 the right hand moves into the bass clef as well.

The music is now fortissimo and in D major. The right hand holds its chords longer while the bass descends in octaves beneath them. The whole eight-bar section is enclosed in repeat signs.

Reviewing Kinderszenen in 1839, Ludwig Rellstab took the title to mean music for children to play. A child would need “three hands”, he complained. He added that even then some of it would be difficult.

A single C rises to F and is held. The melody then climbs again towards the F an octave above. Underneath, the other voices move slowly, each with its own line.

On Saturday, 24 February 1838, Schumann recorded in his diary that he had composed “the little thing Träumerei”. The following evening he worked on another Kinderszene, in F major, which he thought “very pretty”.

On 17 March 1838 Schumann told Clara that he had written “some thirty small droll things” and chosen about twelve for his Kinderszenen. He promised that she would enjoy them, though she would have to forget herself as a virtuoso.

When Marie Wieck played six of the pieces in Dresden on 18 January 1853, Träumerei was not among them. In Vienna on 17 March 1857 Clara’s pupil Nanette Falk played three, all from Marie’s list, so it was missing from that programme too.

After the middle passage’s cadences in G minor and D minor, the opening F returns at bar 17 and Schumann restores the first phrase. A high A is held under a fermata in bar 22. The final descent is marked ritardando.

In 1877 Friederike Medem published silhouettes with verses for four of the pieces, Träumerei among them. A Leipzig edition of 1886 paired the music with poems by Albert Träger and pictures by Alexander Zick. In 1943–⁠44 UFA made a film called Träumerei.

The right hand carries the tune in F major over short chords and bass notes. Rests in the accompanying voices leave gaps beneath the melody. The metre is 2/4.

The second part begins mezzo-forte. Bass notes now last a whole bar, while the melody and its short accompanying chords continue above them. The right hand plays accented notes as the phrase extends.

The closing bars have accents in both hands. A long ritardando follows as the music descends the keyboard. The final F major chord spans from a low F to the quiet right hand and is held under a fermata.

The right hand rests on the downbeat and plays a chord halfway through the beat. Its long–short–long rhythm of crotchet, quaver and crotchet sits across the three-beat bar. Accents mark the chords.

The second part keeps the rhythm of the first unchanged. Chromatic notes enter the chords and bass, and the music later reaches fortissimo. Both halves have repeat signs.

On 6 July 1838 Schumann wrote to his publisher Raimund Härtel asking for news of Kinderszenen. “They will grow too old with time,” he wrote. “Please — do not forget them; I long to see them.”

The piece is in G♯ minor and in 2/8, so each bar holds two quavers. The melody ties its notes across the bar lines while the left hand plays semiquavers underneath. Schumann writes ritardandos before the fermatas, and both return through the piece.

The opening pattern returns, with the melody tied across the barlines over a turning left-hand accompaniment. The phrases again stop on fermatas. Each new phrase begins quietly.

Walter Kempowski printed this piece in musical notation at the front of his childhood memoir, published in Berlin in 1995. The book was titled Weltschmerz. Kinderszenen fast zu ernst (world-weariness, childhood scenes almost too serious).

A B recurs in the melody. Below it, sharps and naturals move the inner parts by semitones. Schumann marks the opening pianissimo.

In the passage marked Schneller (faster), the right hand plays short chords while the left runs up and down, still pianissimo. Later Schumann adds sforzando marks to the returning tune.

In October 1839 Liszt praised Kinderszenen in an open letter to Berlioz, calling Schumann “a poet full of feeling and a great musician”. Schumann kept the cutting in his scrapbook and marked the closing paragraph in red.

A repeated B sounds in the middle of the piano while the upper notes rock above it. The left hand has the same dotted rhythm. Schumann keeps the lullaby quiet and repeats its short figures.

The middle passage is in E major and marked pianissimo. The rocking accompaniment continues under a fuller right-hand melody. As the phrase descends, the right hand moves into the bass clef, close to the left.

The opening returns in the one-sharp signature, piano, with its repeated B and rocking accompaniment. In the last phrase Schumann stretches a ritardando across several bars. The hands stop on a chord held under a fermata.

Both hands begin with piano chords in G major, in common time. The inner voices move by step. The phrase swells under a hairpin and closes before the music begins again.

The piano leaves the hymn. Short runs and grace notes move through the treble, pianissimo, and pause under fermatas. Schumann writes the passage without barlines, as an unbarred recitative in triplet groups (first edition, Breitkopf & Härtel, p. 20, third system).

The opening chords return in G major. The ending is longer this time. The chords descend, the ritardando extends over the final bars and the bass reaches a low G, and the last chord is held under a fermata.