AGNESI, Maria Teresa (1720-1795) - Sonata per il clavicembalo

Maria Teresa Agnesi (1720-1795) - Sonata (Sol maggiore) per il clavicembalo

Performers: Fine Zimmermann (harpsichord)

Painting: Pietro Longhi (c.1701-1785) - The Music Lesson

Further info: Maria Teresa Agnesi (1720-1795) - Concerto per il cembalo

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Maria Teresa Agnesi [Pinottini]

(Milan, 17 October 1720 - Milan, 19 January 1795)

Italian composer and keyboardist. As a girl she performed in her home while her elder sister Maria Gaetana (1718-1799) became a distinguished mathematician lectured and debated in Latin. Little is known about her early training, although her cantata 'Il restauro d’Arcadia' was produced at the Teatro Ducale in Milan in 1747, followed in 1751 by her opera 'Sofonisba'. Further stage works were produced, expanding her reputation as a composer throughout Lombardy. In June 1752 she married Pietro Pinottini, and her fortunes declined thereafter. At her death, she was in pecuniary difficulties. Her instrumental music demonstrates an affinity with the prevailing early Classical Empfindsamkeit, while her stage works are all in the manner of opera seria. Her works include at least six operas or serenatas, four concertos for keyboard, two fantasias, and several keyboard sonatas, in addition to a few miscellaneous works.

ZANDER, Johan David (1753-1796) - Sinfonia för Stor Orchester (1785)

Johan David Zander (1753-1796) - Sinfonia (B-Dur) | för Stor Orchester,

Ödmjukast tillägnad | Sällskapet | Utile Dulci (1785)

Performers: Kungliga Operаns Orkester; Philip Brunеllе (conductor)

Drawing: Unknown artist (18th Century) - A Group of Edinburgh Characters (c.1790)

Further info: Royal Swedish Court: Music from the 18th Century

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Johan David Zander

(Stockholm, 15 October 1753 - Stockholm, 21 February 1796)

Swedish conductor, violinist, viola player and composer. He was born into a musical family. His father, Johan David Gottfried Zander (1714-1774), was a musician (bassoonist, oboist, and violinist) who had emigrated to Sweden and played in the Royal Court Orchestra, the Hovkapellet. Following his father's footsteps, he joined the Hovkapellet as a violinist in 1772. His talent quickly earned him recognition, and he was promoted to assistant concertmaster in 1787, and deputy Konzertmeister the next year, a post he held until his death. He taught the violin at the Swedish Royal Academy of Music from 1785 and at the Opera school from 1786; he became a member of the Academy in 1786. He gained a considerable reputation as a highly skilled soloist on both the violin and viola in public concerts throughout the capital. While best known for his theatrical music, he also composed a significant body of instrumental work, displaying his awareness of contemporary European stylistic trends, particularly the influence of the Austrian composers. His most notable surviving large-scale orchestral work is the Symphony in B-flat major (1785), one of the few four-movement symphonies written in Sweden during the 18th Century. He also composed several concertos (mostly lost), three string quartets and various solo and chamber pieces published in collections like Musikaliskt Tidsfördrif. His promising career was tragically cut short when he died prematurely of pneumonia in 1796. He remains as an important figure in the Gustavian era of Swedish music. 

ROSS, John (1763-1837) - Concerto in B flat major

John Ross (1763-1837) - Concerto (V) in B flat major, Op.1

Performers: Roger Bеvаn Williams (organ); Scοttish Baroque Players

Drawing: French school (18th Century) - Caroline Wuiet De Meonide (1784)

Further info: Eighteenth-Century Organ Concertos

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John Ross

(Newcastle-on-Tyne, 12 October 1763 - Craigie Park, 28 July 1837)

English organist and composer. He studied for seven years with Matthias Hawdon, organist of St. Nicholas's Church. From 1783 to 1836 he was organist of St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Aberdeen, and was for several years organist to the Aberdeen musical society. In Aberdeen he was long the only resident musician of any standing. He died on 28 July 1837 at Craigie Park, a suburban residence. He was a prolific composer of pianoforte and vocal music. He contributed several airs to Robert Archibald Smith's ‘Scottish Minstrel,’ and was complimented by Robert Tannahill for setting some of his songs to music. He edited ‘Sacred Music, consisting of Chants, Psalms, and Hymns for three Voices,’ London, 1828, the tunes in which are mostly his own. His anthem, ‘When sculptured urns,’ was once very popular.

GLEBA, David Joseph (b. 1956) - Missa in honorem Sanctissimae Trinitatis

David Joseph Gleba (b. 1956) - Missa in honorem Sanctissimae Trinitatis (1994)

Performers: Schola Cantorum of the Saint Gregory Society; members of the New Haven Symphony Orchestra;

Nicholas Renouf (conductor)

Painting: Jørgen Roed (1808-1888) - Street in Roskilde. In the Background the Cathedral (1836)

Further info: David J. Gleba

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David Joseph Gleba

(El Paso, Texas, 9 December 1956)

American organist, composer, and teacher. His father was an officer in the United States Army. Due to his father's career, Gleba's family traveled extensively during his childhood and adolescence, which included a prolonged period living in Europe. He began teaching himself to play the pianoforte at an early age. As a teenager, he studied piano for one year with the late Leopold Godowsky III, who was a grandson of the pianist Leopold Godowsky I, and a nephew of George and Ira Gershwin. Gleba has served as an organist and music director at numerous churches, which has fostered his particular fondness for sacred choral music. Through intensive study of classical scores, he taught himself to compose symphonies, sonatas, concerti, and other classical forms. He insists on composing in the Viennese classical style of the second half of the 18th Century. Today, he performs only occasionally. He teaches harmony, counterpoint, composition, piano, harpsichord, clavichord, and organ at his home in Branford, Connecticut. 

HERTEL, Johann Wilhelm (1727-1789) - Concerto per il Organo

Johann Wilhelm Hertel (1727-1789) - Concerto per il Organo | accompagnato | da | 2 Corni, 2 Flauti | 2 Violini, Violetta et Basso, | composto et dedicato | all'Altezza Serenissima | di | FEDERICO |

Duca Regnante di Meclenburgo

Performers: Mеrsеburger Hofmusik; Michael Schönhеit (organ & conductor)

Painting: Cornelis Troost (1696-1750) - Sint Nicolaasfeest

Further info: Johann Wilhelm Hertel - Concertos

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Johann (Giovanni) Wilhelm (Guilielmo) Hertel

(Eisenach, 9 October 1727 - Schwerin, 14 June 1789)

German violinist, keyboard player and composer. Son of Johann Christian Hertel (1697-1754), he received his musical training from his father and members of the Bach family. He also came to the attention of Franz Benda, who heard him perform in 1742 in Strelitz, where his father had moved. Upon Benda’s recommendation Hertel was trained in Berlin and at the court of Zerbst before obtaining a position as Kapellmeister with Duke Christian Ludwig of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. From 1770 he was the privy councillor in the service of Princess Ulrike but continued to compose, arrange concerts at the court and give music instruction. In his last years he gave up the violin and devoted himself to keyboard instruments. As a theorist, Hertel wrote four volumes on musical compositions, which were published in Leipzig between 1757 and 1758. In his youth Hertel was considered one of the best violinists of Franz Benda’s school. As a composer, he is best known for his craftsmanship that blends a progressive harmonic language with technical display. His music includes a Mass, five Passions, 12 secular cantatas (and seven with nontraditional sacred texts), 11 Lutheran cantatas, numerous chorales, 40 concert arias, 60 Lieder, three motets, three Psalms (in German), two sets of incidental music for Shakespeare plays, 63 symphonies, 15 keyboard concertos (and 31 other concertos), three partitas, five trios, 19 violin sonatas, and 30 keyboard sonatas. His literary works include a treatise on thoroughbass, three autobiographies and a collection of essays by Voltaire and others.