Clara Schumann Wieck learned to compose, and from childhood to middle age she produced a good body of work. Clara wrote that "composing gives me great pleasure... there is nothing that surpasses the joy of creation, if only because through it one wins hours of self-forgetfulness, when one lives in a world of sound". At age fourteen she wrote her piano concerto, with some help from Robert Schumann, and performed it at age sixteen at the Leipzig Gewandhaus with Mendelssohn conducting. As she grew older, however, she became more preoccupied with other responsibilities in life and found it hard to compose regularly,
Friedrich Wieck "For Clara's sake and the world's, we can no longer keep each other at a distance. You too are now a family man – is a longer explanation needed?". The reconciliation was welcomed by Clara, although Robert was less enthusiastic. In 1844 Wieck was again involved in managing Clara's career, but by March 1850 he was promoting the musical career not of Clara but of her sister, Marie, as well as the singer Minna "Schulz-Wieck," whom he falsely advertised as his daughter. Wieck published a very positive review of Frédéric Chopin's Variations on "La ci darem la mano" in the