Ulster Hall, Belfast Tues 1.05pm Adm free 0044-3709011227
CLASSICAL:In 1839, 20-year-old Clara Wieck, who was already a piano virtuoso to be reckoned with, confided to her diary that a woman "must not compose...It would be arrogance". At that time, of course, Wieck had been composing for nearly 10 years, and had already written what was to be her largest-scale work, a piano concerto. The following year Clara married the love of her life, the composer Robert Schumann, and her own composing faded from her life as she dealt with the conflicting demands of motherhood and her performing career, as well as her husband's career and the fluctuating mental states that led him to attempt suicide and end his days in an asylum.
Clara Schumann the pianist was a figure talked about in the same breath as Liszt. Clara Schumann the composer was, for a long time, a little-known alter ego. But in recent decades her music has appeared in print, on disc, and, increasingly, in the concert hall.
The BBC’s annual summer series of free invitation concerts with the Ulster Orchestra is this year highlighting the work of female composers, and Clara’s youthful concerto is the first offering in the concert that opens the series at the Ulster Hall in Belfast on Tuesday. Chinese pianist Sa Chen is the soloist, and the programme, conducted by Howard Shelley, also includes Schubert’s Fifth Symphony.
