Sophie Pacini: My Clara Schumann and Fanny Hensel Top Five
In an exclusive playlist, German-Italian pianist Sophie Pacini presents her favourite piano works by two of the most important female composers of the Romantic era.
Read more…I first heard Clara Schumann’s concerto on the radio. I was 16 and driving to my piano lesson. I’d switched it on during the recapitulation of the first movement and sat there asking myself: "what is this piece? Who is this composer?" You always first ask which "Komponist" (male composer) rather than which "Komponistin" (female composer) – it’s just habit. At first I thought: "Wow, this composer, he really has an extremely broad knowledge of the piano’. It was so linear, so clearly structured and at the same time so fiery and filled with inner passion. We’d arrived early – which hardly ever happened – and I just sat there. This was before you had everything in the internet, so I listened until the end to hear what it was.
From that time I focused more and more on Clara Schumann’s music, and though at that age I didn’t really feel confident enough to play her concerto, one is always so influenced by what is around it. I often played Clara Schumann’s Romance as an encore, for example, and I always got the same reaction. The audience would totally love this music, and I would always notice their look as soon as I finished: this look of being unsure about what it was. I’d say, "That was Schumann". There’d be a look of "Ah, yes of course". And then I’d say "Clara Schumann!"
I love Fanny Hensel's Songs for piano: on my album 'In Between' I included Op. 2 No. 1 along with Op. 8 No. 3, which until Fanny’s death was published under the name of Felix Mendelssohn. Then her husband assigned a lawyer to the music and it was returned to her name – but only posthumously. She wrote lots of songs: unlike Clara Schumann, she was a very songful creature, or at least that’s how Heinrich Heine described her on one of his visits to the Mendelssohns. And when you hear her music, you hear an incredible lust for the new – to go in new directions, to try new modulations.
I’ll finish with the fourth of the 'Mélodies' Op. 5, which has occupied me a great deal and is actually my favourite work by Fanny Hensel. There’s also a personal story, since while doing a piano masterclass course I found a sheet of music on the piano in one of the rooms. I turned it over and there was no name on it, and it took me a long time to find out what it was. I fell in love with the piece straight away, and I have programmed it a lot. I find the modulation and the harmony so modern, so flamboyant, so individual and so personal.