KRIEGER, Johann Philipp (1649-1725) - Magnificat à 15

Johann Philipp Krieger (1649-1725) - Magnificat | à 15 | 17. | 2 Clarin. | Tamburi. | 2 Violin. |

3 Viol. | Fagott. | S.A.T.B. | 4 in Rip. | con | Continuo

Performers: Collegium Vocale Lеipzig; Chursächsіsche Capelle; Michael Schönhеіt (conductor)

Painting: Juste-Aurèle Meissonnier (1695-1750) - Chariot of Apollo, Ceiling Design for Count Bielinski's Cabinet

Further info: Der Mitteldeutschen Barockmusik

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Johann Philipp (Giovanni Filippo) Krieger [Kriger, Krüger, Krugl et al.]

(Nuremberg, bap. 27 February 1649 - Weissenfels, 6 February 1725)

German composer and organist. Elder brother of Johann Krieger (1652-1735), Johann Mattheson told the following about his early musical training in Nuremberg: ‘In his eighth year [he] began clavier lessons with Johann Drechsel [Johannes Dretzel], a pupil of Froberger; he also received instruction on various other instruments from the famous Gabriel Schütz’. According to Doppelmayr ‘he progressed so rapidly in this [clavier lessons] that already at the age of nine he amazed large audiences with his playing; moreover, he was able to play any melody that was sung to him and to perform well-made arias that he himself had written’. At the age of 14 or 16 he went to Copenhagen to study organ playing with the royal Danish organist Johannes Schröder and composition with Kaspar Förster. Declining a position as organist at Christiania (Oslo) he returned to Nuremberg after a stay of four or five years in Copenhagen. He cannot have remained long in Nuremberg, for Mattheson reported, confusingly, that he was both at Zeitz in 1670-71 and organist and later Kapellmeister at the court at Bayreuth between 1670 and 1672. When Margrave Christian Ernst left the Bayreuth court in 1673 to join the war against France, he was given permission to travel to Italy without loss of salary. He probably stayed there for about two years. Mattheson stated that in Venice he studied composition with Johann Rosenmüller and the clavier with G.B. Volpe, and that in Rome he studied composition with A.M. Abbatini and the clavier and composition with Bernardo Pasquini. Immediately after his visit to Italy he played for the Emperor Leopold I in Vienna, in return for which, in a letter dated 10 October 1675, the emperor ennobled him and all his brothers and sisters. He soon left Bayreuth for Frankfurt and Kassel and was offered positions in both cities. He apparently refused them or held them for only a short time, for on 2 November 1677 he accepted a position as organist at the court at Halle. When Duke August died in 1680 his successor, Johann Adolph I, moved the court to Weissenfels. He went with him as Kapellmeister, a position he held until his death. After his death his son Johann Gotthilf Krieger (who succeeded his father as Kapellmeister until 1736) continued the catalogue until 1732. Johann Philipp Krieger was one of the outstanding German composers of his time, especially of church cantatas, of which he wrote over 2000 (nearly all lost); under his direction the cultivation of music at the small court at Weissenfels rose to the highest level of German court music.

FORKEL, Johann Nikolaus (1749-1818) - Sinfonia in Es-Dur (1780)

Johann Nikolaus Forkel (1749-1818) - Sinfonia (Es-Dur) | per | II Corni, II Clarinetti,

Fagotto obl. II Violini, | Braccio è Violoncello (1780)

Performers: Gοttingеr Barockorchester, Antonius Adаmskе (conductor)

Painting: Wilhelm von Kobell (1766-1853) - Viehmarkt am Rande einer Stadt (c.1802)

Further info: Gottingen Christmas Cantatas

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Johann (Iogann) Nikolaus (Nicolaus) Forkel

(Meeder, 22 February 1749 - Göttingen, 20 March 1818)

German composer, professor, and historian. His earliest education was in Coburg, with local Kantor Johann Heinrich Schulthesius, following which in 1766 he attended the Johannischule in Lüneberg. Shortly thereafter he moved to Schwerin to become assistant conductor of the cathedral choir. Noticed by Duke Friedrich of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, he was given a stipend to study at Göttingen University beginning in 1769. A year later he was awarded the post of university organist, receiving his doctorate in 1787. The following year he published his 'Allgemeine Geschichte der Musik' followed in 1792 by the 'Allgemeine Litteratur der Musik', both of which established him as a major historian-bibliographer of the period. His correspondence with the sons of Johann Sebastian Bach led him to create over a period of several decades one of the first biographical studies, published in 1802 as 'Über Johann Sebastian Bach: Leben, Kunst und Kunstwerke' as part of an attempt to bring out Bach’s complete works. His scholarly studies often overshadowed his work as a composer. Surviving works include 22 Lieder, five keyboard concertos, seven trio sonatas, four large cantatas or odes, and several sets of variations and smaller keyboard works. His musical style tends to follow the norms of the period, with particular influence of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. He is generally regarded as one of the founders of modern musicology.

CARVALHO, João de Sousa (1745-1798) - Te Deum (1792)

João de Sousa Carvalho (1745-1798) - Te Deum (1792)

Performers: Naoko Okada (soprano); Brigette Fournier (soprano); Michel Brodard (bass); John Elwes (tenor);

Choeue et Orchestre Gulbenkian de Lisbonne; Michel Corboz (1934-2021, conductor)

Drawing: "Thierry" brothers (publishers) (c.1827-c.1850) - Décoration du Ballet Historique Donné au 

Théatre de la Cour, à Rio de Janeiro, le 13 de mai 1818

Further info: Carvalho: Te Deum

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João de Sousa Carvalho

(Estremoz, 22 February 1745 - Alentejo, 1798)

Portuguese composer and teacher. On 28 October 1753 he began music studies at the Colégio dos Santos Reis in Vila Viçosa. A royal grant enabled him to enrol on 15 January 1761 at the Conservatorio di S Onofrio in Naples, where he studied with Cotumacci. In 1766 his setting of Metastasio’s La Nitteti was performed in Rome. On returning to Portugal he joined the Irmandade de S Cecília at Lisbon on 22 November 1767. In the same year he was appointed professor of counterpoint in the Seminário da Patriarcal, where he later served as mestre (1769-73) and as mestre de capela (1773-98) and taught such noted musicians as António Leal Moreira, Marcos António Portugal and João José Baldi. In 1778 he succeeded David Perez as music teacher to the royal family. Upon retirement from the Seminário da Patriarcal he owned extensive properties in both the Algarve and Alentejo. Carvalho was the foremost Portuguese composer of his generation, and one of the finest in the country’s history. His numerous elaborate church works in the style of Jommelli display a thorough control of counterpoint and structure, with keen, assertive melodic writing in the fast movements. He is equally distinguished as a composer of opere serie and serenatas, of which 14 by him were performed at the royal palaces of Ajuda and Queluz. 

BOCCHERINI, Luigi (1743-1805) - Sinfonia a piu Stromenti (1771)

Luigi Boccherini (1743-1805) - Sinfonia (C-Dur) 'SINFONIE | A | Plusieurs Instruments récitants |

COMPOSÉES | Pour S.A.R. L'Infant dom Louis d'Espagne ... Œuvre 16' (1771)

Performers: New Philharmonia Orchestra; Raymond Lеppаrd (1927-2019, conductor)

Painting: Fernando Brambila (1763-1834) - La Granja. Vista de la fachada principal del Real Palacio

Further info: Boccherini - Complete Symphonies Op. 12

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(Ridolfo) Luigi Boccherini

(Lucca, 19 February 1743 - Madrid, 28 May 1805)

Italian composer and cellist. He was the third child of the musician Leopoldo Boccherini (1712-1766) and his wife Maria Santa, née Prosperi (?-1776). When he reached the age of 13, he was sent to Rome to study with the renowned cellist Giovanni Battista Costanzi, musical director at Saint Peter’s Basilica. In Rome Boccherini was influenced by the polyphonic tradition (i.e., music with two or more interweaving melodic parts) stemming from the works of Giovanni da Palestrina and from the instrumental music of Arcangelo Corelli. In 1757 Boccherini and his father were invited to play in the Imperial Theatre orchestra in Vienna. On his second journey to Vienna (1760), Boccherini, at 17, made his debut as a composer with his Six Trios for Two Violins and Cello, G 77–82. During his third stay in that city (1764), a public concert by Boccherini was enthusiastically received. In August 1764 he obtained a permanent position in Lucca with the local church and theatre orchestras. He was in Lombardy in 1765, in the orchestra of Giovanni Battista Sammartini. Through his association with this Milanese composer, the 22-year-old Boccherini strengthened the new “conversational” style of the quartet: the cello’s line was now as important as the counterpoint (i.e., the intertwining of independent melodic lines) of the violin and viola. Boccherini put together the first public string quartet performance, with an extraordinary string quartet made up of outstanding Tuscan virtuosos, including himself, Pietro Nardini, Nardini’s pupil Filippo Manfredi, and Giuseppe Cambini. After the death of his father (1766), Boccherini left Lucca for Paris, which was at that time particularly hospitable to Italian musicians. 

According to tradition, it was the Spanish ambassador to Paris who persuaded Boccherini to move (probably in 1768 or early 1769) to Madrid, where he began his long sojourn at the intrigue-ridden court of Charles III. The king’s brother, the infante Don Luis, conferred on him a yearly endowment of 30,000 reals as a cellist and composer. Boccherini first began writing string quintets during this period, and he also wrote his well-known Six String Quartets (1772). At about the same time, he married Clementina Pelicho, with whom he had five children. In 1785, when both Clementina and the infante died, the king granted him a pension of 12,000 reals, after which he was free to accept the patronage of (among others) Frederick William II of Prussia, who was an amateur cellist and well acquainted with Boccherini’s music. Boccherini married Joaquina Porreti in 1787. From 1787 to 1797 he may have been in Berlin, at a post provided by Frederick William II, although this position has not been adequately documented; it seems equally likely that he remained in Spain. In 1798 the new king of Prussia refused to extend Boccherini’s pension, the duchess of Osuna (another important source of income) moved to Paris, and Boccherini’s financial distress was aggravated by poor health. His life was further saddened by the death of two of his daughters in 1802 and the death of his second wife and a third daughter in 1804. Reportedly, he was by then living in near poverty, although his financial plight may have been exaggerated. Certainly, however, his own health suffered from his personal losses, and he died in 1805 of a long-standing respiratory ailment. 

SCHAFFRATH, Christoph (1709-1763) - Concerto con Cembalo Obligato

Christoph Schaffrath (1709-1763) - CONCERTO (Es-Dur) | con | Cembalo Obligato

| 1. Violino | 2. Violino | Viola | et | Violoncello

Performers: Armin Thаlhеim (harpsichord); Händеlfеstspiеlorchester Des Opernhauses Halle;

Howard Armаn (conductor)

Painting: Franz Xaver Wagenschön (1726-1790) - Erzherzogin Marie Antoinette (1755-1793) am Spinett

Further info: Christoph Schaffrath - Orchestral works

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Christoph Schaffrath [Schafrath, Schafrat, Schaffroth et al.]

(Hohenstein, 1709 - Berlin, 17 February 1763)

German theoretician, keyboardist and composer. According to early biographical information, he received his earliest training on the harpsichord at the age of 9, probably in Dresden, which was close to his birthplace. By 1730 he was a keyboardist in the Polish Kapelle of August II, and when this was dissolved he moved briefly to Slawuta in Poland (now in Ukraine) to become a musician at the court of Prince Sangusko-Lubatowicz of Lithuania. By 1733 he unsuccessfully sought the position of organist at the Frauenkirche in Dresden but accepted a position with Crown Prince Frederick of Prussia at Rheinsberg. He was made principal accompanist in 1740 upon his patron ascending the Prussian throne, and in 1744 he accepted a lifelong position as musician to Frederick II’s sister, Princess Anna Amalia, to whom he dedicated his first published set of keyboard sonatas (Op.1) in 1746. Schaffrath was a competent and prolific composer who focused almost entirely upon instrumental works. His music includes 20 overtures or symphonies (all for strings, but with a few woodwinds on occasion); 72 concertos for the harpsichord; eight concertos for two harpsichords, violin, flute, and oboe (and others for flute, oboe, bassoon, and viola da gamba that have been lost); 30 trio sonatas, 40 sonatas for a single instrument and keyboard; and around 40 sonatas for keyboard alone. As a member of the Berlin School, he wrote in a mixture of galant and the older contrapuntal styles, though his formats often use contrasting themes and triplet figurations.