Just days after Stellenbosch University marked World Movement Disorders Day with a Parkinson’s awareness flash mob at the Neelsie Student Centre, one of the institution’s most celebrated musicians has offered a deeply personal account of life with a movement disorder.
For acclaimed pianist Nina Schumann, a routine mammogram in 2012 became a turning point. “There weren’t any signs,” she recalls. “I simply went for my first mammogram and found out on that day that I had breast cancer.” The diagnosis, which led to a double mastectomy, was the first of three conditions that would gradually reshape her identity as a performer and teacher.
A year later came focal dystonia, a neurological disorder that began as a slight constriction in the fingers of her left hand. “Out of all three conditions, the earliest signs were probably from Parkinson’s,” she said. Subtle symptoms including loss of smell and a right arm that no longer swung naturally predated her Parkinson’s diagnosis in 2018, when she was 48.
For a musician whose career was built on precision and control, the impact has been profound. “I cannot practise the same amount I did before,” Schumann explained. Parkinson’s now dictates her daily routine, structured around a strict four-hour medication cycle.
The reality of these changes became starkly visible when she watched herself in Concerto, screened at the recent Stellenbosch Woordfees. “It was jolting,” she admits. “I often had the thought: should I have that removed from the documentary? … But of course, that is the whole point. It depicts the reality.”
Directed by Jurg Slabbert, the documentary follows Schumann as she prepares to perform Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2, the work that launched her career. Three decades on, she approaches it with a different focus, trading technical perfection for emotional depth.
To keep playing, Schumann has reimagined her technique, compensating for limited wrist movement by adjusting her posture and angle at the piano. “I have to try and find solutions every day,” she added. What illness has taken in physical ease, it has returned in expressive richness. “Now I’m focusing very much on sound production and presenting the material in a musical way.”
She credits her students as a vital source of strength, as well as the wider Parkinson’s community that has reached out to her. “It helps me make peace with my situation. It’s a two-way street,” she said, stressing the importance of openness and conversation.
Despite ongoing challenges, Schumann continues to teach and perform, with annual commitments such as the Stellenbosch International Chamber Music Festival and an upcoming performance of Rachmaninoff’s concerto in the United States next October.
“I don’t take it as a given anymore,” she said of playing the piano. “I focus much more on the expression and communication of the musicality that I have, rather than the technique and that’s quite a wonderful space to be in.”
Cape Argus
