The USS Quad Damage

The Schumanns and Brahms

So I listen to 2MBS yadda yadda Karl Haas is awesome yadda. On today's episode, which was titled "Clara, Robert, Johannes", about Robert and Clara Schumann, and Johannes Brahms (if it wasn't already obvious).

As it turns out, these guys had a crazy interesting life which easily rivals the OC, which my brother loves way too much. Basically, Clara (who was composing at the age of 11, and met Robert at around this time) and Robert(who was 20ish) became "special friends", the kind that get married 10 years later after a court case by Clara's dad. They wrote a shitload of "fine music" for each other. Schumann wrote "variations on a theme" of something Clara wrote, when they met, and Clara wrote variations on something Schumann wrote as a gift for his 40th Birthday.

This is not innuendo for sex, they really wrote music. They were composers, der!

This is where Brahms enters the picture. You see, Brahms and Schumann are great friends, and being co-composers, Johannes gets along great with Clara. In addition, Robert's got a life-threatening illness. Brahms actually does a variation on the same theme that Clara did for Robert's 40th, which was "filled with a great sorrow for Schumann and a great love for Clara". What kind of love is left to the listener.

Would you hit it if you were Johannes?

Anyway, it got me wondering why this wasn't made into a movie. Not only do they wear funny clothes, but the storyline is tre magnifique (Schumann was german, so there's no racial pun there). I think smart people with integrity make for a much more interesting film than skanky hoes who know nothing except how to look good. Various permutations of people screwing other people does not hold my interest, because the people themselves are without character. In addition, their music could be used as actual background music for the movie. You may not even need words. Now that's a love story!

Also, they could make it into a video game like Quake.