Clara was a composer during the romatic Era. The Romantic Era changed the way composers composed for many reasons. One reason the era changed was because this era moved away from what the classical era had always stuck to. The Classical era had strict laws of balance and restraint while the romantic era moved away from that and let the composer have artistic freedom, experimentation, and creativity. The pieces of the romantic era were very expressive with a very dominant feature, the melody. Some Romantic Era composers used their music to express their cultural identity and how they were different from other composers. Some composers used colour or tried to get instruments to make sounds that they didn't usually make or add new instruments to their pieces. Some composers also used music to tell a story or the music would have some other artistic background to it. Composers sometimes had vocal musical work in their pieces this came to be known as an art song. The art song would have symbolical meanigs of words in the tit. Opera was increasingly popular during this era and it was similar to an art song. The music that was written was often very difficult to play but was beautiful to listen to.
Below is a chart showing when the Romantic Era, and other Era's, started and ended and the eras that led up to the Romantic Era.