Italian Sailors’ Song (Album for the Young Op. 68 No. 36)

Robert Schumann · Level 4 (Intermediate) · Romantic · Piano

After a slow, recitative-like introduction, a lively, rhythmic G minor tarantella, like a sailors’ dance. From the Album for the Young Op. 68 (1848), 43 pieces Schumann wrote for his eldest daughter’s birthday. G minor, 6/8, 52 bars (about 5 minutes), complete score.

▶ Play this piece with the interactive score

How to practise it

• Listen first: the site plays it while the score scrolls.
• Wait mode: the score waits for you at every note, at your own pace.
• Tempo challenge: play in time, with a score and a map of the bars you got right.
• Take your time over the fermatas of the introduction, then launch the dance with light, well-detached eighths. Each piece tells a little scene: look for the character suggested by the title. The piece starts with a pickup: count the incomplete bar before coming in. In 6/8, count the beats as groups of three eighths (dotted beats) to keep the lilt.

More pieces by Robert Schumann

• Siciliano (Album for the Young Op. 68 No. 11)
• May, Dear May, Soon You’ll Be Here Again! (Album for the Young Op. 68 No. 13)
• Untitled piece “* * *” (Album for the Young Op. 68 No. 26)
• A Curious Story (Kinderszenen Op. 15 No. 2)
• Blind Man’s Buff (Kinderszenen Op. 15 No. 3)
• Happy Enough (Kinderszenen Op. 15 No. 5)
• An Important Event (Kinderszenen Op. 15 No. 6)
• Scheherazade (Album for the Young Op. 68 No. 32)

Source : Mutopia Project · CC BY-SA 2.5