Breakneck

Schumann's op. 86, here in a new edition with a clear piano reduction by Johannes Umbreit, did not have it easy at the beginning. Although new in terms of instrumentation and described by Schumann as "something quite curious", publishers and audiences did not immediately accept the work, which was completed in 1849. First the Bonn publisher Simrock and later Breitkopf & Härtel turned the composer down. It was not until April 1850 that the work was accepted for publication by the Hamburg publisher J. Schuberth & Co.

The first performance took place privately in October 1849 in the home of the valve horn virtuoso Joseph Rudolf Lewy in Dresden. Carl Heinrich Hübler, also the author of a concert piece for four horns and orchestra, was also a member of the horn quartet. The actual premiere took place on February 25, 1850 in the Leipzig Gewandhaus. Remarkably, the first horn player of the horn quartet, Eduard Pohle, decided to play the breakneck part on his more familiar natural horn. The performance is said not to have been unproblematic: "too difficult and too long", noted one listener.

This piece is still incredibly difficult to play - and yet it is one of the most popular and most frequently performed works in horn literature today.

Robert Schumann, Concert Piece for 4 Horns and Orchestra op. 86, edited by Ernst Herttrich, piano reduction by Johannes Umbreit, HN 1138, € 28.00. G. Henle, Munich 2014