Listening in London

Abstract Chapter 5 explores the reception of the Leipzig chamber works within nineteenth-century London. Questions about whether the music was more conservative or progressive centered less on the repertory’s relationship to Schumann’s earlier works and more on its comparison with the output of Felix Mendelssohn. For conservative English critics, Schumann was Mendelssohn’s opposite, the dubious modernist to Mendelssohn the classicist, with Schumann eventually linked with “Brother Wagner” and the “dangerous music of the future.” Exploring this reception illuminates striking differences between mid-century English and Continental views of Schumann-the-figure, between conservative and progressive voices in London (including those of critics, directors, and performers), and between social classes, especially as the chamber works moved from rarefied environments into more affordable concert venues. Clara Schumann also figures prominently in this chapter, for as a widow she spent more time concertizing in London than in any other European capital, visiting nineteen times during 1856–1888. Her efforts to promote Robert’s music—a focus of her widowhood and one facilitated in part by her performance of the Op. 47 piano quartet and Op. 44 piano quintet—played a substantial role in changing the English debate about the merits of her husband’s music.