In the Clara Schumann anniversary year, there are special concerts everywhere in Germany and exhibitions in Zwickau, Frankfurt, Bonn and Leipzig. In the latter city alone — her birthplace — there are some 170 events honoring Schumann in 2019. New biographies and diaries of her youth have been published, and Clara Schumann's compositions, long forgotten, are turning up on playbills.

Her image is nearly universally familiar in Germany — at least to those who were around before the euro was adopted in 2002 — as "the woman on the 100 Deutsche Mark bill" that was introduced in 1989. Beyond that, though, Clara Schumann left an indelible mark on music life, one still palpable today.