Gassmann: Opera Overtures (Naxos Audio CD)

• If the career of the Bohemian composer Florian Leopold Gassmann (1729-1774) had not been cut cruelly short by his death resulting from a fall from a carriage, his name might be a good deal better known today for he was an accomplished composer of attractive, well-wrought operas that occupy an important place in the history of Venetian and Viennese 18th-century opera.

• This recording features a selection of Gassmann’s overtures, including those for three of his most popular operas, Il viaggiatore ridicolo (The Ridiculous Traveller), L’amore artigiano (Love in the Workplace) and La contessina (The Young Countess).

• Following the fast-slow-fast pattern typical of the mid-eighteenth century opera, these works are noteworthy for their bright cheerful themes, lovely lyrical writing and sensitive orchestration.