Fairy-Tale Pictures

In the summer of 1852, Vier Stücke [‘Four Pieces’] for viola and piano by Robert Schumann were published under the title Märchenbilder [‘Fairy-Tale Pictures’] by the Kassel publishing house Luckhardt, with a particularly expressive vignette on the title page. Unusual were both this title Märchenbilder, on the one hand, and the scoring with a solo viola, on the other. With the viola in a soloistic role in chamber music, Schumann’s Märchenbilder, Op. 113, offers a rather unfamiliar, but all the more delightful sound.