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One of the leading German composers of the early nineteenth century, Robert Schumann is known for his short piano pieces and songs. He was born in Zwickau, Saxony, in 1810. He began his musical education at the age of six, later studying piano with the celebrated teacher Friedrich Wieck and becoming acquainted with Wieck's nine-year-old daughter, Clara. At this young age, she was already a brilliant pianist just beginning a successful concert career.
 A few years later, Schumann fell in love with the teenage Clara. She reciprocated his affection but obeyed her father when he ordered her to break off the relationship. They were separated for more than a year before Clara made the first move toward a reconciliation. On September 13, 1837—her 18th birthday—Schumann formally asked her father's permission to marry her.
During their three-year engagement, Schumann entered one of his most fertile creative periods, producing a series of imaginative works for piano. It was during this time, in 1838, that he composed approximately thirty short pieces reflecting an adult's perception of childhood. These vignettes were eventually gathered into thirteen pieces under the title Kinderszenen, or Scenes from Childhood. These works are strung together like beads on a necklace to form a single chain, yet each is complete in itself. Today, the thirteen Scenes from Childhood are an essential part of the concert piano repertoire.
Clara Wieck and Robert Schumann married in 1840. In his later years, his mental and physical health declined; he suffered from the effects of melancholia and mental illness, eventually passing away in 1856.
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