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,
Fantasie in C (Schumann) not spotted until 1910. The text of the passage quoted is: "Accept then these songs [beloved, which I sang for you alone]". Both the Schlegel stanza and the Beethoven quotation are appropriate to Schumann's current situation of separation from Clara Wieck. Schumann wrote to Clara: "The first movement may well be the most passionate I have ever composed – a deep lament for you". They still had many tribulations to suffer before they finally married four years later. Liszt was one of the few pianists capable of meeting the then-unparalleled demands of the "Fantasie", particularly the second movement coda's rapid