Clara Schumann, preeminent pianist of her generation, looks back from late in her astonishing career at the two breathless weeks that changed her life forever. It was August, 1856, in the tiny Swiss resort of Gersau on Lake Lucerne. Clara’s husband Robert, towering composer of German romanticism, has been dead for three weeks. Robert’s young protégé, Johannes Brahms, is with Clara – along with Brahms’ younger sister and two of Clara’s seven children. Clara is 36. Johannes, 23. They are desperately in love — they’ve been in love, all with the tacit approval of Robert, who is now gone. They’ve come to the banks of Lake Lucerne to decide, once and for all. Two actors, in three scenes placed between four movements – one from each of Brahms’ four symphonies – we experience the possibilities of what might have happened.
