Editing Robert Schumann (section)

===Songs===
{{See also|List of vocal compositions by Robert Schumann}}
The authors of ''[[The Record Guide]]'' describe Schumann as "one of the four supreme masters of the German {{lang|de|[[Lied]]}}", alongside Schubert, Brahms and [[Hugo Wolf]].<ref name=st686>Sackville-West and Shawe-Taylor, p. 686</ref> The pianist [[Gerald Moore]] wrote that "after the unparalleled Franz Schubert", Schumann shares the second place in the hierarchy of the {{lang|de|Lied}} with Wolf.<ref>Sams, p. vii</ref> ''[[Grove's Dictionary of Music and Musicians]]'' classes Schumann as "the true heir of Schubert" in {{lang|de|Lieder}}.<ref>Böker-Heil, Norbert, David Fallows, John H. Baron, James Parsons, Eric Sams, Graham Johnson, and Paul Griffiths. [https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000016611 "Lied"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221007062201/https://www.oxfordmusiconline.com/grovemusic/view/10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.001.0001/omo-9781561592630-e-0000016611 |date=7 October 2022 }}, ''Grove Music Online'', Oxford University Press, 2001 {{subscription required}}</ref>

Schumann wrote more than 300 songs for voice and piano.<ref name=gj/> They are known for the quality of the texts he set: Hall comments that the composer's youthful appreciation of literature was constantly renewed in adult life.<ref name=hsong>Hall, pp. 1126–1127</ref> Although Schumann greatly admired [[Goethe]] and Schiller and set a few of their verses, his favoured poets for lyrics were the later Romantics such as [[Heinrich Heine|Heine]], [[Joseph Freiherr von Eichendorff|Eichendorff]] and [[Eduard Mörike|Mörike]].<ref name=st686/>

Among the best-known of the songs are those in four cycles composed in 1840 – a year Schumann called his {{lang|de|Liederjahr}} (year of song).<ref>Daverio, p. 191</ref> These are {{lang|de|[[Dichterliebe]]}} (Poet's Love) comprising sixteen songs with words by Heine; {{lang|de|[[Frauen-Liebe und Leben#Schumann's setting|Frauenliebe und Leben]]}} (Woman's Love and Life), eight songs setting poems by [[Adelbert von Chamisso]]; and two sets simply titled {{lang|de|Liederkreis}} – German for "Song Cycle" – the [[Liederkreis, Op. 24 (Schumann)|Op. 24]] set, consisting of nine Heine settings and the [[Liederkreis, Op. 39 (Schumann)|Op. 39]] set of twelve settings of poems by Eichendorff.<ref>Daverio and Sams, pp. 797 and 799</ref> Also from 1840 is the set Schumann wrote as a wedding present to Clara, {{lang|de|[[Myrthen]]}} ([[Myrtus|Myrtles]] – traditionally part of a bride's wedding bouquet),<ref>Finson (2007), p. 21</ref> which the composer called a song cycle,  although comprising twenty-six songs with lyrics from ten different writers, this set is a less unified cycle than the others. In a study of Schumann's songs [[Eric Sams]] suggests that even here there is a unifying theme, namely the composer himself.<ref>Sams, p. 50</ref> 
[[File:Du Ring an meinem Finger.jpg|thumb|left|upright=1.65|Opening of "{{lang|de|Du Ring an meinem Finger|italic=no}}" from {{lang|de|[[Frauen-Liebe und Leben|Frauenliebe und Leben]]}}|alt=Musical score with line for voice and two lines below for piano accompaniment]]

Although during the twentieth century it became common practice to perform these cycles as a whole, in Schumann's time and beyond it was usual to extract individual songs for performance in recitals. The first documented public performance of a complete Schumann song cycle was not until 1861, five years after the composer's death; the [[baritone]] [[Julius Stockhausen]] sang {{lang|de|Dichterliebe}} with Brahms at the piano.<ref name=r222>Reich p. 222</ref> Stockhausen also gave the first complete performances of {{lang|de|Frauenliebe und Leben}} and the Op. 24 {{lang|de|Liederkreis}}.<ref name=r222/>

After his {{lang|de|Liederjahr}} Schumann returned in earnest to writing songs after a break of several years. Hall describes the variety of the songs as immense, and comments that some of the later songs are entirely different in mood from the composer's earlier Romantic settings. Schumann's literary sensibilities led him to create in his songs an equal partnership between words and music unprecedented in the German {{lang|de|Lied}}.<ref name=hsong/> His affinity with the piano is heard in his accompaniments to his songs, notably in their preludes and postludes, the latter often summing up what has been heard in the song.<ref name=hsong/>