Slowly, searching is a modern-day homage to the lyricism, melancholy, and passion of Robert Schumann. German pianist Susanne Kessel created a project titled Kreisleriana 2010, inviting eight composers to choose a movement of Schumann's beloved suite as inspiration for their own voice. I was touched by the fourth, Sehr Langsam, and chose a few notes from it as my point of departure, and later, development. Two hundred years since this great composer's birth, the themes of peacefulness, joy, madness, and deep pain remain a human constant, and there is catharsis to be found through music.