Baroque Era
1716
Jacobite rebellion in Scotland collapses; James Edward Stuart returns to France; leading rebels are executed • Austrians under Prince Eugene of Savoy defeat Turks at Peterwardein • Sebastiano Ricci - A Bacchanal and Feast in Honour of Pan • Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz died in Hanover
1717
Austrians under Prince Eugene capture Belgrade from Turks • Louis XV (Fr) grants charter for Louisiana territory to Scottish financier John Law and his Company of the West • German physicist Gabriel Fahrenheit announces his system for measuring temperature • Prussia becomes first country to introduce compulsory education • Alexander Pope (Eng): poem Eloisa to Abelard
1718
Troops sent by Spanish king Felipe V seize the island of Sicily • Allied invasions of Sicily and northern Spain • Sweden attacks Norway; King Karl XII (Swe) is killed • Treaty of Passa-rowitz ends Austro-Turkish war • Building of Elysee Palace in Paris • Voltaire (Fr): tragedy Oedipe
1719
Spain sends an unsuccessful expedition to Scotland to help Jacobites (Stuart supporters) • Irish parliament passes Declaratory Act allowing British parliament to pass laws for Ireland • France is at war with Spain • Bubonic plague spreads from Russia to eastern-central Europe • Daniel Defoe (Eng): Robinson Crusoe
1720
Quadruple Alliance (Britain, France, Netherlands, Austria) and Spain agree Treaty of the Hague: Felipe V (Sp) gives up claims in Italy; Holy Roman Emperor Karl VI (Aus) abandons claims to Spain; Sicily goes to Austria; Savoy gets Sardiniar • Collapse of Scottish financier John Law’s Mississippi scheme triggers financial panic in France and England leaving many people ruined • Voltaire (Fr): tragedy Artemise • Alexander Pope (Eng) completes translation of Homer’s Iliad
Gottfried Wilhelm (von) Leibniz (1646 – 1716) was a German polymath and philosopher who occupies a prominent place in the history of mathematics and the history of philosophy.
1716
Francois Couperin publishes his L’art de toucher le clavecin (The Art of Playing the Harpsichord). This important keyboard treatise includes useful tips such as: "One can correct facial grimaces by placing a mirror on the reading desk of the spinet or harpsichord." It also offers historically intriguing insights into recommended performance manners: "... one should look at the audience, if there is any, as if one were occupied with nothing else."
March
The Pieta governors fire Antonio Vivaldi, but then reinstate him two months later in the post of maestro de’ concerti.
Francesco Geminiani publishes his Corelli-influenced Op. 1 violin sonatas in London.
Geminiani, Sonata for violin and Basso Continuo in D minor, op.1 no.12, "Impetuosa"
1 April
Antonio Caldara takes up the post of vice-Kapellmeister at the court of Charles VI in Vienna.
August
Johann David Heinichen is appointed Kapellmeister to the Dresden Court.
John Christopher Smith uproots from Ansbach to join George Frideric Handel in London, where he becomes the composer’s his life-long assistant.
The Amsterdam publisher Etienne Roger takes receipt of six sonatas and six concertos commissioned from Antonio Vivaldi (Op. 5 and Op. 6 respectively). Commissions by publishers are uncommon at this time, but Vivaldi’s popularity makes it a safe venture.
Antonio Vivaldi - 6 Violin Sonatas Op 5
00:01 Sonata No. 1 in F Major, RV 18
09:05 Sonata No. 2 in A Major, RV 30
14:50 Sonata No. 3 in B Flat Major, RV 33
22:57 Sonata No. 4 in B minor, RV 35
31:10 Sonata No. 5 in B Flat Major, RV 76
38:13 Sonata No. 6 in G minor, RV 72
Antonio Vivaldi - 6 Violin Concertos Op.6
1. Concerto No.1 in G minor RV 324 0:15
2. Concerto No.2 in E flat major RV 259 9:06
3. Concerto No.3 in G minor RV 318 17:30
4. Concerto No.4 in D major RV 216 24:52
5. Concerto No.5 in E minor RV 280 30:22
6. Concerto No.6 in D minor RV 239 37:32
November
Antonio Vivaldi presents Juditha triumphans at the Ospedale della Pieta. Vivaldi’s (one surviving) oratorio, composed for an all-female cast, contains allegorical references to the ongoing Venetian war against the Ottoman Turks.
A. VIVALDI: «Juditha triumphans» RV 644
14 November
Carlo Francesco Pollarolo’s Ariodante premieres in Venice, providing Faustina Bordoni with her operatic debut. The 19-year-old mezzo soprano gains the nickname The New Siren.
Ariodante
Partitura dell'opera in facsimile / [testo di] Antonio Salvi; [musica di] Carlo Francesco Pollarolo
Faustina Bordoni
Faustina Bordoni (30 March 1697 – 4 November 1781) was an Italian mezzo-soprano.
Early career
She was born in Venice and brought up under the protection of the aristocratic brother composers Alessandro and Benedetto Marcello. Her singing teacher was another composer, Michelangelo Gasparini. For many years in the service of the Elector Palatine, she made her operatic debut at Venice in 1716 in Carlo Francesco Pollarolo's Ariodante, singing in her home city until 1725 in operas by Albinoni, the Gasparini brothers, Giacomelli, Leonardo Leo, Giuseppe Maria Orlandini, the Pollarolos, father and son, and Leonardo Vinci, amongst others. In 1718 and 1719 in Venice she sang alongside Francesca Cuzzoni, later to become her great rival. During this period she also performed several times at Reggio nell'Emilia, Naples and Parma, and at least once in Milan, Modena and Florence. After her German début in 1723, singing in Pietro Torri's Griselda at Munich, she was a great favourite north of the Alps during the 1720s, also enjoying great success in Vienna (1725–26). Her nickname was the "new siren", and she was commonly known simply as "Faustina".
"The Rival Queens"
Her London début, as Rossane in Handel's Alessandro, took place on 5 May 1726, alongside Senesino and Cuzzoni. During the next two seasons she created four more Handel roles: Alceste in Admeto and Pulcheria in Riccardo Primo (both 1727), and Emira in Siroe and Elisa in Tolomeo (1728). She also sang in a revival of Radamisto, and in operas by Ariosti and Giovanni Bononcini. In a performance of the latter's Astianatte on 6 June 1727, a riot broke out in the audience between her followers and those of her 'rival' Cuzzoni in the King's Theatre, Haymarket, in front of Caroline, Princess of Wales.
This furore seized the public imagination and a great deal of journalistic exaggeration – the pamphleteer John Arbuthnot published "The DEVIL to pay at St. JAMES's: Or A full and true ACCOUNT of a most horrid and bloody BATTLE between Madam FAUSTINA and Madam CUZZONI", in which he lambasted the two ladies: "TWO of a Trade seldom or ever agree … But who would have thought the Infection should reach the Hay-market and inspire Two Singing Ladies to pull each other's Coiffs, to the no small Disquiet of the Directors, who (God help them) have enough to do to keep Peace and Quietness between them. … I shall not determine who is the Aggressor, but take the surer Side, and wisely pronounce them both in Fault; for it is certainly an apparent Shame that two such well bred Ladies should call Bitch and Whore, should scold and fight like any Billingsgates." Recent research has shown, however, that it was the singers' supporters who were behaving badly, rather than the singers themselves, who had worked together before in Italy and continued to work together for the Royal Academy until the directors were forced to dissolve it in 1728 owing to mounting debts.
Later career
Unlike Cuzzoni, Faustina never returned to England. During the years 1728–1732, she was again much in evidence on the stages of major Italian cities, especially Venice. In 1730, she married the German composer, Johann Adolf Hasse, and the following year the couple were summoned to the court of Augustus the Strong at Dresden, where Faustina enjoyed a great success in her husband's opera Cleofide. They were described by the famous librettist Metastasio as "truly an exquisite couple".
Hasse remained at the Saxon court for more than thirty years, and his wife sang in at least fifteen of the operas he composed between Caio Fabricio in 1734 and Ciro riconosciuto (1751). Faustina was, however, permitted to make many long trips to Italy, appearing again in Naples, Venice, Parma and elsewhere in operas by Pergolesi, Porpora and Vinci, alongside those of her husband. Though she retired from the theatre in 1751, Faustina kept her salary and title of virtuosa da camera to the Elector until the death of Augustus' successor, Frederick Augustus II in 1763.
At this point, she and her husband moved to Vienna, before removing finally to Venice in 1773. They had two daughters, both trained singers. On a visit in 1772, Charles Burney described Faustina as "a short, brown, sensible, and lively old woman ... with good remains … of that beauty for which she was so much celebrated in her youth." Unlike her rival Cuzzoni, who died in poverty, Faustina had a happy and prosperous old age.
1717
Johann Sebastian Bach completes his Little Organ Book: "For the glory of the most high God alone, and for my neighbour to learn from."
J. S. Bach - Orgelbüchlein ( Little Organ Book )
BWV 599-644
Francois Couperin becomes keyboard composer to the French royal court. By this time he has committed to print three Lecons de tenebres, his finest sacred works, scored for one to two sopranos and continuo. This year sees the publication of his second book of Pieces de clavecin, featuring many character pieces.
F. Couperin - 3 Leçons de Ténèbres
F. Couperin - Second book (1717) - Ordres 6 to 12
Ordre 6ème de clavecin in B flat major
Ordre 7ème de clavecin in G major
Ordre 8ème de clavecin in B minor
Ordre 9ème de clavecin in A major
Ordre 10ème de clavecin in D major
Ordre 11ème de clavecin in C major
Ordre 12ème de clavecin in E major
Alessandro Marcello's melodious Oboe Concerto in D minor is published around this time in Amsterdam, forming part of an anthology of works by Italian composers.
Allessandro Marcello - Oboe Concerto in D minor
Summer
George Frideric Handel moves to Cannons, Edgware (near London), home of Earl James Brydges of Carnarvon, future Duke of Chandos. As resident composer, Handel begins to concentrate on sacred works, including his (later named) Chandos Anthems.
Handel - Chandos Anthems Vol. 1 (No. 1, 2 & 3)
Handel - Chandos Anthems Vol 2 (No. 10 & 11)
5 August
In Cothen Johann Sebastian Bach is appointed Kapellmeister to the court of Prince Leopold, with the prospect of doubling his current salary. Bach’s family move from Weimar, but Bach himself has to remain, unable to secure immediate release from his contract to Duke Wilhelm Ernst.
September
Antonio Lotti moves to Dresden, having obtained leave from his post as first organist at St Marks, Venice. He stages his opera Giove in Argo (Zeus in Argos) in the Redoutensaal the following month.
Antonio Lotti - Sinfonia dal Melodramma Patorale 'Giove in Argo'
September
The Dresden court invites Johann Sebastian Bach to undertake a keyboard duel with the virtuoso Louis Marchand, organist to King Louis XV of France. Daunted by the challenge, Marchand flees the city.
21 February
Johann Sebastian Bach's name appears in print for the first time, in Johann Mattheson's Das beschutzte Orchestre. He is described as ‘the famous Weimar organist’.
9 April
Composer Georg Matthias Monn is born in Vienna.
2 November
Johann Jacob Walther, German composer and virtuoso violinist, dies in Mainz, aged about 67.
19 June
Composer Jan Václav Antonín Stamic is baptised in Nemecky Brod, Bohemia.
6 November
Johann Sebastian Bach, still insistent that he should be released from service at Weimar, finally incurs the wrath of his employer, Duke Wilhelm Ernst. The composer spends the next month in jail for failure of duties and general impertinence. In December he is free to move to Cothen to take up the post of Kapellmeister.
17 July (evening):
George Frideric Handel’s Water Music suite is first performed by around 50 musicians on a large barge on the Thames, accompanying King George and his entourage up river from Whitehall to Chelsea. The king enjoys the music so much that he orders two repeat performances, ending in the early hours of the morning. The event marks the first documented use of horns in English orchestral music.
George Frideric Handel - Water Music
Suite in F major 00:01
Suite in G major 36:23
Suite in D major 48:20
26 November
Daniel Purcell, English composer, died.
Georg Matthias Monn
Georg Matthias Monn (born Johann Georg Mann April 9, 1717, Vienna – October 3, 1750, Vienna) was an Austrian composer, organist and music teacher whose works were fashioned in the transition from the Baroque to Classical period in music.
Together with Georg Christoph Wagenseil and Josef Starzer, Monn formed the Viennese Pre-Classical movement (Wiener Vorklassik), whose composers are nowadays mostly known only by their names. However, his successful introduction of the secondary theme in the symphony was an important element for the First Viennese School that would come some fifty years later.
Much less is known about Monn's life than about his musical ideas. Only his appointments as an organist are known, at first in Klosterneuburg near Vienna. Afterwards, he was appointed in the same position at Melk in Lower Austria and at the Karlskirche in Vienna's Wieden district. He died of tuberculosis aged 33.
Together with Georg Christoph Wagenseil and other contemporaries such as Leopold Mozart and Josef Starzer, Monn could be said to represent a school of Austrian composers who had thoroughly studied the principles of counterpoint as practised by Johann Sebastian Bach and Johann Joseph Fux, but also effected a change from the formalistic, imposing and ornate Baroque style to the simpler, more graceful Galante music. Moreover, they renewed the sonata form by expanding the concepts of secondary theme and development. Later on, Michael and Joseph Haydn would develop these concepts to a much greater extent.
Georg Matthias Monn - Sinfonia in G
Georg Matthias Monn - Cello Concerto in G minor
Matthias Georg Monn - Concerto for violin, strings & continuo in B flat major
Monn - Harpsichord concerto in B minor
Jan Václav Antonín Stamic
Jan Václav Antonín Stamic (later, during his life in Mannheim, Germanized as Johann Wenzel Anton Stamitz; 18 June 1717, Deutschbrod, Bohemia – 27 March 1757, Mannheim, Electorate of the Palatinate) was a Czech composer and violinist. His two surviving sons, Carl and Anton Stamitz, were scarcely less important composers of the Mannheim school, of which Johann is considered the founding father. His music is stylistically transitional between Baroque and Classical periods.
Life
Stamitz's family came from Marburg (today Maribor, Slovenia).
Stamitz spent the academic year 1734–1735 at the University of Prague. After only one year, he left the university to pursue a career as a violin virtuoso. His activities during the six-year period between his departure from the university in 1735 and his appointment in Mannheim around 1741 are not precisely known.
He was appointed by the Mannheim court in 1741 or 1742. Most likely, his engagement there resulted from contacts made during the Bohemian campaign and coronation of Carl Albert (Karl VII) of Bavaria, a close ally of the Elector Palatine. In January 1742, Stamitz performed before the Mannheim court as part of the festivities surrounding the marriage of Karl Theodor, who succeeded his uncle Karl Philipp as Elector Palatine less than a year later; Carl Albert was among the wedding guests.
Stamitz married Maria Antonia Luneborn on July 1, 1744. They had five children together, Carl Philipp, Maria Franziska, Anton Thadäus Nepomuk, and two children who died in infancy.
Probably around the late summer of 1754, Stamitz paid a yearlong visit to Paris, perhaps at the invitation of music patron Alexandre Le Riche de La Poupelinière with whom he stayed, appearing in public there for the first time at a Concert Spirituel on September 8, 1754. His Parisian success induced him to publish his Orchestral Trios, Op. 1 (actually symphonies for string orchestra), and possibly other works of his by various publishers there.
He probably returned to Mannheim around the autumn of 1755, dying there in spring 1757, less than two years later, at the age of 39. The entry of his death reads:
“(March 30, 1757. Buried, Jo’es Stainmiz, director of court music, so expert in his art that his equal will hardly be found. Rite provided)”
Compositions
Stamitz’s most important compositions are his 58 symphonies and his 10 orchestral trios. The orchestral trios are actually symphonies for strings, but may be played one player to a part as chamber music. His concertos include numerous ones for violin, two for viola, two for harpsichord, 12 for flute, one for oboe and one for clarinet, among the earliest concertos for the instrument (Johann Melchior Molter's six from the 1740s seem to have been the first). He also composed a large amount of chamber music for various instrumental combinations, as well as eight vocal works including his widely circulated concert Mass in D.
Jan Václav Stamic - 6 Trios for Orchestra Op.1
Jan Václav Stamic - Organ Concerto No.1 in D major
Jan Václav Stamic - Organ Concerto No.2 in C major
Jan Václav Stamic - Organ Concerto No.3 in B flat major
Jan Václav Stamic - Organ Concerto No.4 in E flat major
Jan Václav Stamic - Clarinet Concerto in B flat major
Johann Stamitz - Missa Solemnis in D-major (1750)
Johann Stamitz: Op. 4 n. 2 - Sinfonia Pastorale in D major
Jan Václav Stamic - Sinfonia in A major "Frühling"
1718
Composer-violinist Francesco Manfredini publishes his twelve Concerti Grossi Op. 3, for two violins and continuo, in Bologna.
Francesco Manfredini 12 Concerti Op.3
Concerto Grosso in F major, Op. 3/1 0:00
Concerto Grosso in D minor, Op. 3/5 5:21
Concerto Grosso in D major, Op. 3/9 11:05
Concerto Grosso in A minor, Op. 3/2 19:19
Concerto Grosso in D major, Op. 3/6 24:02
Concerto Grosso in G minor, Op. 3/10 30:22
Concerto Grosso in E minor, Op. 3/3 39:52
Concerto Grosso in G major, Op. 3/7 45:11
Concerto Grosso in C minor, Op. 3/11 51:44
Concerto Grosso in B flat major, Op. 3/4 59:27
Concerto Grosso in F major, Op. 3/8 1:04:37
Concerto Grosso in C major, Op. 3/12 "Christmas Pastorale" 1:11:14
Having left the Pieta in Venice, Antonio Vivaldi arrives in Mantua where he becomes chamber maestro di cappella to Prince Philip of Hesse-Darmstadt.
March
Maurice Greene is appointed organist of St Paul’s Cathedral, London.
Summer
George Frideric Handel's Esther, the first English oratorio, is performed privately at the Edgware residence of the Earl of Carnarvon. The public will have to wait 14 years to hear it.
Georg Friedrich Händel - Esther HWV 50a
22 June
AntonioVivaldi's opera Scanderbeg reopens the Teatro della Pergola in Florence. The story concerns the life of the eponymous 15th-century Albanian folk hero who battles against the Ottomans as they attempt to conquer Albania.
Like his oratorio Juditha triumphans (1716), Vivaldi’s opera patriotically allegorises the Venetian-Ottoman war (1714-18).
Antonio Vivaldi - Scanderbeg, (fragments) RV 732
1. Aria (Doneca) `Fra catene ognor penando" (Act 1, Scene 8) - 4:26
2. Aria (Doneca) `Nelle mie selve natie` (Act 2, Scene 2) - 9:29
3. Recitative (Ormondo, Scanderbeg) & Aria (Scanderbeg) `Con palme ed allori` (Act 2, Scene 9) - 14:07
4. Recitative (Ormondo) & Aria (Ormondo) `S`a voi penso luci belle` (Act 2, Scene 10) - 19:22
12 April
Johann Joseph Fux presents his oratorio Cristo nell’orto (Christ in the Garden) for Holy Week at the Hofburgkapelle in Vienna.
Johann Joseph Fux - Sacred Vocal Works
Te Deum N. 271
Stabat Mater N. 268
Summer
George Frideric Handel’s first English language stage-work, the masque Acis and Galatea, is performed at Cannons, Edgware. The libretto is co-written by John Gay, Alexander Pope and John Hughes.
Handel - Acis and Galatea - HWV:49
Autumn
Nicola Antonio Porpora's opera Temistocle premieres at the Hoftheater in Vienna. The libretto is by Apostolo Zeno, who has this year-been appointed poet-laureate at the imperial court of Charles VI.
26 November
Alessandro Scarlatti produces his first and last comic opera, Il trionfo dell’onore, at the Teatro dei Fiorentini, Naples. The opera is well received and performed 18 times during the winter season.
Alessandro Scarlatti - Il trionfo dell’onore
1719
In one of the famous musical non-event, Johann Sebastian Bach narrowly misses George Frideric Handel in Halle, having travelled there from Cothen to see him. The two composers will never meet.
Summer
The Earl of Burlington, visiting Italy, invites Giovanni Bononcini to become a composer for the Royal Academy of Music in London.
Members of the nobility, with support from King George, establish The Royal Academy of Music for the promotion of Italian opera. George Frideric Handel is authorised to headhunt high-quality singers from abroad.
Summer
Domenico Scarlatti resigns his position as maestro di cappella at St Peter’s in Rome. He makes his way to Portugal (possibly via England) where he receives a significant increase in salary as mestre of the royal chapel in Lisbon.
Publisher Etienne Roger issues Antonio Vivaldi's six Op. 6 concertos (received three years previously), in Amsterdam.
Antonio Vivaldi - 6 Concertos for Violin, Strings and Basso Continuo [1717]:
1. Concerto No.1 for Violin, Strings and B.C. in G minor RV 324
[Allegro/Grave/Allegro] 0:15
2. Concerto No.2 for Violin, Strings and B.C. in E flat major RV 259
[Allegro/Largo/Allegro] 9:06
3. Concerto No.3 for Violin, Strings and B.C. in G minor RV 318
[Allegro/Adagio/Allegro] 17:30
4. Concerto No.4 for Violin, Strings and B.C. in D major RV 216
[Allegro/Adagio/Allegro] 24:52
5. Concerto No.5 for Violin, Strings and B.C. in E minor RV 280
[Allegro/Largo/Allegro] 30:22
6. Concerto No.6 for Violin, Strings and B.C. in D minor RV 239
[Allegro/Largo/Allegro] 37:32
13 September
Antonio Lotti’s opera Teofane premieres in Dresden as part of the sumptuous festivities surrounding the marriage of Crown Prince Friedrich Augustus to Maria Josepha, Archduchess of Austria. The following month Lotti and his wife, the soprano Santa Stella (Santa Stella Scarabelli
1686-1759), return to Venice, flush with a departing gift of carriage and horses.
Antonio Lotti - Sinfonia (Teofane, 1719)
Opera 'Teofane' by Antonio Lotti
19 April
Leonardo Vinci (of no relation to the Renaissance polymath) cements his opera-writing career with the Neapolitan dialect comedy Lo cecato fauzo (The Fake Blind Man), which creates a sensation at the Teatro Fiorentini in Naples.
Leonardo Vinci - Lo cecato fauzo - So le ssorva e le nespule amare
14 November
Composer and theorist Leopold Mozart is born in Augsburg.
30 November
The Royal Academy appoints George Frideric Handel as Master of the Orchestra. The composer is still abroad at this time.
Leopold Mozart
(b. Augsburg, November 14, 1719; d. Salzburg, May 28, 1787)
German violinist and composer, father of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. He attended high school in Augsburg and entered the Benedictine University in Salzburg in 1737, where he studied philosophy and law. In 1743, after a brief period of service to a Salzburg nobleman, he was appointed fourth violinist in the court orchestra of the Archbishop of Salzburg. He married Anna Maria Pertl, from nearby St. Gilgen, in 1747; they had seven children, of whom only two—Maria Anna (b. 1751, nicknamed “Nannerl”) and Wolfgang (b. 1756)—survived to adulthood. In 1758 he became the orchestra’s second violinist, and in 1763 he was promoted to the post of deputy Kapellmeister.
His efforts to cultivate Wolfgang’s talent and expand the boy’s musical horizons, which involved lengthy periods of travel away from home, undoubtedly accounted for his lack of further advancement in the Salzburg musical hierarchy. In later years, as relations between his son and the archbishop grew strained, Leopold had to take much of the heat.
Leopold Mozart was one of the finest fiddlers in Europe. He had a broad range of intellectual interests and an equally broad range as a composer: His oeuvre includes numerous symphonies (many now lost), as well as liturgical settings, serenades, divertimentos, and partitas, and a small number of chamber and solo keyboard works.
Of his compositions that have retained a place in the repertoire, the most familiar are the Cassation in G (ca. 1760; an arrangement long attributed to Joseph Haydn, better known as the Toy Symphony) , and the Trumpet Concerto in D (1762). In addition to presiding over the education of the greatest genius in the history of music—no small achievement— Leopold Mozart wrote the most important violin method of the mid-18th century: Versuch einer griindlichen Violinschule (A Treatise on the Fundamental Principles of Violin Playing), published in 1756, the same year Wolfgang was born.
Leopold Mozart - Seven Symphonies
1. Symphony in F (Eisen F 6)
2. Symphony in F (Eisen F 2)
3. Symphony in A (Eisen A 1)
4. Symphony in D (Eisen D 18)
5. Symphony in G (Eisen G 5)
6. Symphony in G (Eisen G 7)
7. Symphony in D major (Eisen D 26)
Leopold Mozart - Toy Symphony
Leopold Mozart - Trumpet Concerto in D majo
1720
Johann Sebastian Bach composes his six Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin, and around this time the six Suites for solo cello. The solo string works are unprecedented in their compositional and emotional range.
The crowning glory is (arguably) the Chaconne from the Partita No. 2 in D minor, with its grand opening statement and 31 imaginative variations.
J. S. Bach - Sonatas & Partitas for Solo Violin
0:00 Sonata No.1 in G minor, BWV 1001
1. Adagio 2. Fuga. Allegro 3. Siciliana 4. Presto
14:49 Partita No.1 in B Minor, BWV 1002
1. Allemanda 2. Double 3. Corrente 4. Double. Presto
5. Sarabande 6. Double 7. Tempo di Borea 8. Double
34:12 Sonata No.2 in A minor, BWV 1003
1. Grave 2. Fuga 3. Andante 4. Allegro
56:22 Partita No.2 in D minor, BWV 1004
1. Allemanda 2. Corrente 3. Sarabanda 4. Gigue
5. Ciaccona
1:26:16 Sonata No.3 in C major, BWV 1005
1. Adagio 2. Fuga 3. Largo 4. Allegro assai
1:47:20 Partita No.3 in E Major, BWV 1006
1. Preludio 2. Loure 3. Gavotte en Rondeau 4. Menuet
5. Menuet 6. Bourrée 7. Giga
J.S. Bach - Cello Suites No.1-6 BWV 1007-1012
1. Cello Suite No.1 in G major BWV 1007 0:00
Prelude Allemande Courante Sarabande Minuet Gigue
2. Cello Suite No.2 in D minor BWV 1008 18:07
Prelude Allemande Courante Sarabande Minuet Gigue
3. Cello Suite No.3 in C major BWV 1009 38:02
Prelude Allemande Courante Sarabande Bourree Gigue
4. Cello Suite No.4 in E flat major BWV 1010 1:00:39
Prelude Allemande Courante Sarabande Bourree Gigue
5. Cello Suite No.5 in C minor BWV 1011 1:24:47
Prelude Allemande Courante Sarabande Gavotte Gigue
6. Cello Suite No.6 in D major BWV 1012 1:51:02
Prelude Allemande Courante Sarabande Gavotte Gigue
Benedetto Giacomo Marcello publishes Il teatro alia moda (The Theatre in Fashion), a much appreciated pamphlet satirising showy and commercial Italian opera. It remains in print across Europe throughout the 18th and 19th centuries.
July
Maria Barbara Bach dies and is buried in Cothen while her husband is away in Carlsbad. As recounted by Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, 'The news that she had been ill and died reached him only when he entered his own house'. Johann Sebastian Bach is left with four young children to parent alone.
Maria Barbara Bach (30 October 1684 – 7 July 1720) was the first wife of composer Johann Sebastian Bach. She was also his second cousin, the daughter of Johann Michael Bach.
Maria was born at Gehren, Schwarzburg-Sondershausen. She married Johann Sebastian Bach during his tenure as organist of Mühlhausen's St. Blasius Church, a position he assumed in midsummer 1707. That August, he received an inheritance of 50 gulden (more than half his annual salary) from his maternal uncle, Tobias Lämmerhirt. This facilitated the marriage which occurred on 17 October at Dornheim, a village near Arnstadt, her hometown and his previous post. Little is known of her life or their marriage, except that they were contented.
According to her second surviving son, Carl Philipp Emanuel, Maria Barbara's death in 1720 came quickly and unexpectedly: Johann Sebastian was accompanying his employer, the Duke of Köthen, as the duke went to take the waters at the Carlsbad spa (the Duke brought his musicians along to provide him with entertainment). When he left, Maria Barbara was in normal health; when he returned two months later, he learned that she had died and been buried on 7 July. The cause of her death is unknown, but speculations include infectious disease or complications from pregnancy. Maria Barbara bore seven children, three of whom died at an early age:
Catharina Dorothea (28 December 1708 – 14 January 1774).
Wilhelm Friedemann (22 November 1710 – 1 July 1784).
Johann Christoph (23 February 1713 – 23 February 1713).
Maria Sophia (23 February 1713 – 15 March 1713), twin of Johann Christoph.
Carl Philipp Emanuel (8 March 1714 – 14 December 1788).
Johann Gottfried Bernhard (11 May 1715 – 27 May 1739).
Leopold Augustus (15 November 1718 – 29 September 1719).
Prince Philip of Hesse-Darmstadt makes Antonio Vivaldi his musical director in Mantua, but the composer continues his itinerancy, returning briefly to Venice, and then on to Rome. This year see the publication of his twelve Concerti a 5 stromenti, Op. 7, written about three years earlier.
Antonio Vivaldi - 12 Concertos for Violin & Oboe, Op. 7
Concerto for Oboe No.1 in B flat major, Op.7, RV465
Concerto for violin, strings & bc No.2 in C major, RV188
Concerto for Violin No.3 in G minor, Op.7, RV326
Concerto for Violin No.4 in A minor, Op.7, RV354
Concerto for Violin No.5 in F major, Op.7, RV285a
Concerto for Oboe No.6 in B flat major, Op.7, RV374
Concerto for Oboe No.7 in B flat minor, Op.7, RV464
Concerto for Violin No.8 in G major, Op.7, RV299
Concerto for Violin No.9 in B flat major, Op.7, RV373
Concerto for Violin No.10 in F major, Op.7, RV294a
Concerto for Violin No.11 in D major, Op.7, RV208a
Concerto for Violin No.12 in D major, Op.7, RV214
January
Johann Sebastian Bach presents the Clavier-Buchlein to his eldest son, Wilhelm Friedemann Bach.
Johann Sebastian Bach - Klavierbüchlein für Wilhelm Friedemann Bach (Cd No.1)
(A) = Clavecin (B) = Clavichord (C) = Organ
00:00:00 No.1 - Applicatio C-Dur (BWV 994) - (C)
00:01:14 No.2 - Praeambulum 1 C-Dur (BWV 924) - (B)
00:02:14 No.3 - Wer nur den lieben Gott (BWV 691) - (C)
00:03:47 No.4 - Praeludium 2 d-Moll (BWV 926) - (A)
00:04:44 No.5 - Jesu, meine Freude (BWV 753) - (A)
00:06:38 No.6 - Allemande [1] g-Moll (BWV 836) - (B)
00:09:29 No.7 - Allemande [2] g-Moll (BWV 837) - (B)
00:11:03 No.8 - Praeambulum F-Dur (BWV 927) - (A)
00:11:49 No.9 - Praeambulum g-Moll (BWV 930) - (A)
00:13:48 No.10 - Praeludium F-Dur (BWV 928) - (A)
00:15:09 No.11 - Menuett I G-Dur (BWV 841) - (B)
00:16:31 No.12 - Menuett II g-Moll (BWV 842) - (B)
00:17:28 No.13 - Menuett III G-Dur (BWV 843) - (B)
00:19:35 No.14 - Praeludium 1 (BWV 846) - (A)
00:21:18 No.15 - Praeludium 2 (BWV 847) - (B)
00:22:50 No.16 - Praeludium 3 (BWV 851) - (A)
00:23:51 No.17 - Praeludium 4 (BWV 850) - (B)
00:25:03 No.18 - Praeludium 5 (BWV 855a) - (C)
00:26:39 No.19 - Praeludium 6 (BWV 854) - (C)
00:28:11 No.20 - Praeludium 7 (BWV 856) - B)
00:29:27 No.21 - Praeludium 8 (BWV 848) - (B)
00:31:20 No.22 - Praeludium 9 (BWV 849) - (A)
00:33:36 No.23 - Praeludium 10 (BWV 853) - (B)
00:36:26 No.24 - Praeludium 11 (BWV 857) - (A)
00:38:11 No.25 - Pièce pour le Clavecin (BWV deist) - (A)
00:42:57 No.26 - Praeludium C-Dur (BWV 924a) - (C)
00:43:57 No.27 - Praeludium D-Dur (BWV 925) - (C)
00:45:15 No.28 - Praeludium e-Moll (BWV 932) - (C)
00:46:51 No.29 - Praeludium a-Moll (BWV 931) - (A)
00:47:47 No.30 - Baß-Skizze in g-Moll (BWV deest) - (B)
00:48:30 No.31 - Fuge C-Dur (BWV 953) - (A)
00:50:19 No.32 - Praeambulum 1 à 2 (BWV 772) - (B)
00:51:49 No.33 - Praeambulum 2 (BWV 775) - (B)
00:53:06 No.34 - Praeambulum 3 (BWV 778) - (B)
00:54:50 No.35 - Praeambulum 4 (BWV 779) - (B)
00:55:58 No.36 - Praeambulum 5 (BWV 781) - (B)
00:57:09 No.37 - Praeambulum 6 (BWV 784) - (B)
00:58:32 No.38 - Praeambulum 7 (BWV 786) - (B)
27 April
George Frideric Handel's opera Radamisto, the second production of the Royal Academy, is staged at the King’s Theatre in London with great success. King George, to whom the opera is dedicated, attends the premiere with the Prince of Wales. The opera manages eleven performances on its opening run.
George Frideric Handel - Radamist - HWV 12
October
Nicola Antonio Porpora's serenata Angelica e Medoro, on a libretto by Pietro Metastasio, is introduced at court in Naples in celebration of Emperor Charles VI's birthday. The event marks the public debut of the castrato Carlo Broschi (Farinelli) , aged 15, who takes a minor role as the shepherd Tirsi. The libretto is Metastasio's first printed work.
November
George Frideric Handel publishes his first collection of keyboard music, Suites des Pieces pour le Clavecin, Premier Volume, containing works from the Hamburg period as well as new pieces composed in England.
Handel - Suites de Pieces pour le Clavecin 1/2
Suite I in A major HWV 426
Suite II in F major HWV 427
Suite III in D minor HWV 428
Suite IV in E minor HWV 429
Suite V in E major HWV 430
Suite VI in F sharp minor HWV 431
Suite VII in G minor HWV 432
Suite VIII in F minor HWV 433
Handel - Suites de Pieces pour le Clavecin 2/2
Suite I in B flat major HWV 434
Suite II in G major HWV 435
Suite III in D minor HWV 436
Suite IV in D minor HWV 437
Suite V in E minor HWV 438
Suite VI in G minor HWV 439
Suite VII in B flat major HWV 440
Suite VIII in G major HWV 441
19 November
Giovanni Bononcini revives his opera Astarto (1715) to open the second operatic season of the Royal Academy in London. The famous alto-castrato Senesino heads up the cast and remains the Academy’s leading performer over the next eight years.
Giovanni Bononcini - ASTARTO
Senesino (Francesco Bernardi), (31 October 1686 – 27 November 1758) was a celebrated Italian contralto castrato, particularly remembered today for his long collaboration with the composer George Frideric Handel.
December
Johann Sebastian Bach is offered the position of organist at St Jacobi’s in Hamburg.
He turns the job down as it transpires that the new postholder is required to present a significant gift of funds to the church. The position is eventually filled by the son of a rich merchant who donates 4,000 marks—around five times the annual wage of the post itself.
Sebastiano Ricci - A Bacchanal and Feast in Honour of Pan