In Schumann’s middle years there was a longer period in which he favoured larger groups of instruments. Although he composed a few single pieces for piano, they remained unpublished at first. It was only after the resounding success of the “Album for the Young” that he once again turned to several of these pieces to combine them in an album.
Originally the collection was to be called “Spreu” (chaff) but the publisher was not convinced by this. Some of the altogether 34 pieces were finally published under the title “Coloured Leaves”, which quickly became a bestseller. As part of our Schumann revision we have now produced a new version of this edition to reflect the latest in scholarly research.
G. Henle Publishers stands for Urtext sheet music of the highest quality. The Urtext editions not only provide the undistorted and authoritative musical text but are also aesthetically pleasing, optimised for practical use and extremely durable. And then there is the strong, distinctive blue profile: (almost) all of the Urtext editions are bound in the characteristic blue cardboard.
Musicians trust Henle's blue Urtext editions because they:
- provide an undistorted, reliable and authoritative musical text
- offer superb, aesthetically appealing music engraving
- are optimised for practical use (page turns, fingerings)
- are of high quality and durable (cover, paper, binding)
- contain a short preface that introduces the work (particularly useful for AMEB exams) in German, English and French, as well as explanatory footnotes for particularly interesting passages in the score
- contain a description of the sources, an evaluation of the sources, readings and a documentation of the corrections made (= "Critical Report") in German and English, and often also in French
