Schumann's Carnaval has a brilliantly capricious quality, zigzagging quickly back and forth between glee and melancholy. Yang's performance emphasizes that spontaneity.

For Schumann’s bicentennial, four classical music critics of The Times offer recommendations for listening.

Stephen Johnson tries to uncover the mysteries of Schumann's piano suite Carnaval, a work containing many musical puzzles and allusions. Show more Robert Schumann would definitely be a cryptic ...

Alessandra Ammara’s finely honed technique and restless interpretative mind suit Schumann’s volatile musical personality, at least some of the time. She dives right into Carnaval’s “Préambule” with ...

In it he contends that “Carnaval,” Schumann’s Opus 9, “could not have been written by someone who did not suffer from bipolar disorder.” ...

Pianist Amir Farid exhibited bravura. There’s also bravery in a pianist taking on Carnaval, Schumann’s idiosyncratic and formidably difficult set of character pieces.

In contrast, the Schumann Carnaval is a bombastic piece, so full of colours and different personalities, and you can really bring all those little people from the carnival to life.

Schumann: Carnaval, Sonata No. 1 in F-Sharp Minor Evgeny Kissin, piano (RCA Victor) On a new recital album, Evgeny Kissin brings to the fore many of the virtuoso qualities that have made him a ...

Schumann was the archetypal wayward genius whose ability to translate poetical ideas into music is unrivalled. What makes Schumann the quintessential Romantic composer? The Romantic era was intimately ...