When August Klughardt began his career, he gravitated toward the New German school and, as should be considered natural for a young composer at the time, he sought approbation, endorsement and assistance necessary for furthering his career. Klughardt visited Liszt in 1871 and was given warm encouragement. By the 1880s it was fairly evident that Klughardt had drifted away from any appreciable stylistic indebtedness to the waning aesthetics and musical practices of the New German school.
 
The music of Friedrich Gernsheim has often been defined by his relations to Johannes Brahms. They were not close friends, but between the two composers there existed a warm mutual respect. Gernsheim's lively appreciation of Brahms's music left inevidently traces on his own compositions, which after his death caused Gernsheim to be unjustly written off as some kind of dry, unimaginative Brahms imitator.