In 1991, under the auspices of the Institute for the Musical Heritage in Piedmont and the Piedmont Region was founded in Turin the ensemble Astrée, specializing in training instrumental repertoire six eighteenth-century historians and criteria with the use of original instruments.
Very little is known about the life of Giovan Battista Leonetti. He was born in Crema and it is likely that he received his musical education from Giovanni Battista Caletti-Bruni. The latter was the father of Francesco Cavalli, who was to become the central figure in music life in Venice after the death of Claudio Monteverdi. The first - and only - book of madrigals by Leonetti is dedicated to Caletti. This collection also contains two pieces by him, one of them the 'balletto pastorale' Or sì che 'l vago aprile. The booklet doesn't indicate which is the other.
Visitors to Venice had borne witness to Vivaldi’s prowess as a violinist, although some found his performance more remarkable than pleasurable. He certainly explored the full possibilities of the instrument, while perfecting the newly developing form of the Italian solo concerto. He left nearly five hundred concertos. Many of these were for the violin, but there were others for a variety of solo instruments or for groups of instruments, including a score of such works for solo flute or recorder, with strings and harpsichord. He claimed to be able to compose a new work quicker than a copyist could write it out, and he clearly coupled immense facility with a remarkable capacity for variety within the confines of the three-movement form, with its faster outer movements framing a central slow movement.
The Camerata Köln is a Cologne-based chamber ensemble devoted largely to early music, with a special focus on woodwind compositions. The group's repertory includes concertos, quartets, quintets, sonatas, and other works mainly from the post-Renaissance era and reaching into the Classical period. The group concertizes regularly in Germany and most parts of Europe and has made numerous tours of the Americas and other parts of the globe. By 2006, it had made well over 50 recordings…