Fillu

Fillu is a Lieder-opera based around the lives of Eugenie Schumann, the youngest daughter of Clara and Robert, and her romantic and musical partner, the renowned Austrian soprano Marie Fillunger or ‘Fillu’. Both of these women led extraordinary lives in Germany and England in the late 19th century but their history has been sadly overlooked. When Eugenie wrote her memoir, her life-long love was barely mentioned as it had to remain secret. This dramatisation by Eleanor Burke serves as the memoir that they themselves could never write, entwining extracts from Fillu’s love letters with Lieder by Schubert, Brahms, Wolf, as well as Robert and Clara Schumann.