Work for voice and piano by Schumann, performed by Mark Padmore, tenor and Jonathan Biss, piano on October 12, 2014 and work for clarinet and piano by Schumann performed by Richard Stoltzman, clarinet and David Deveau, piano on January 11, 2015. Schumann: Liederkreis, Op. 24Schumann: Fantasiestucke, Op. 73Fantasy is a potent thread running through the work of many Romantic composers, but none more so than Schumann. As a musical form, the ‘fantasy’ is the stuff of strong passions and dramatic emotional shifts, as we hear in the closing work on this podcast, Schumann’s Fantastiestuecke, opus 72 for clarinet and piano. The moods shift dramatically, starting with a movement marked “sweet and with feeling,” and concluding with one marked “fast and fiery.” The work ends in a whirlwind, with calls from the composer to play “schneller und schneller”—faster and faster.Before that, we start with a fantasy of a different sort: Schumann’s Liederkreis, opus 24, a set of songs based on poetry by Heine. The poems tell the tale of a love gone wrong. In nine songs, the singer recounts stories of lost love and painful separation. The nine songs that make up this set, like the poems themselves, vary in length, but they share a directness and simplicity. We’ll hear them performed by tenor Mark Padmore and pianist Jonathan Biss.