Also in 1853, a committee headed by Schumann invited Joachim to the Lower Rhine Music Festival. At the Festival, Joachim again soloed in the Beethoven violin concerto. His success made him, it is said, "the most renowned artist of Germany". Robert Schumann and his wife Clara were deeply impressed, and formed a "close connection" with Joachim. Joachim met the then publicly unknown 20-year-old Brahms, and wrote of him that his playing "shows the intense fire...which predicts the artist" and "his compositions already betoken such power as I have seen in no other musician of his age". Joachim strongly recommended Brahms to Robert. Brahms was received by the Schumanns with great enthusiasm. After Robert's mental breakdown in 1854 and death in 1856, Joachim, Clara, and Brahms remained lifelong friends and shared musical views. Joachim's performing style with the violin, like Clara's at the piano, is said to have been "restrained, pure, antivirtuosic, expressing the music rather than the performer."