Robert Schumann

Robert Schumann was a German composer, pianist, and music critic of the Romantic era. Born to a comfortable middle-class family, Schumann was unsure whether to pursue a career as a lawyer or to make a living as a pianist-composer. He studied law at Leipzig and Heidelberg Universities but his main interests were music and Romantic literature. From 1829 he was a student of the piano teacher Friedrich Wieck, but his hopes for a career as a virtuoso pianist were frustrated by a growing problem with his right hand, and he concentrated on composition. His early works were mainly piano pieces, including the large-scale Carnaval (1834–1835) In 1834 he was a co-founder of the Neue Zeitschrift für Musik which he edited for ten years. In his writing for the journal and in his music he distinguished between two contrasting aspects of his personality, dubbing these alter egos "Florestan" for his impetuous self and "Eusebius" for his gentle poetic side.

8 June 1810

Born on the same birth day (8 June): Alexandre Tuffèri • Ercole Consalvi • Ernst Enno • Ivo Sanader • John Collins (Continental Congress) • John D. Roberts • John R. Deane Jr. • Lindsay Davenport • Mick Hucknall • Rachel Held Evans • Richard Pousette-Dart • Robert Aumann

Born in the same month (June 1810): Ferdinand Freiligrath • Friedrich Wilhelm Schneidewin • Otto Nicolai