Luigi Boccherini
This might be of tangential interest to any Aubreyites on my flist.... (Is that the correct collective noun?) BBC Radio 3's Composer of the Week this week is Luigi Boccherini. The programme blurb reads as follows and, if you have access to the iPlayer, you can listen to the programmes on the Composer of the Week website here.
Luigi Boccherini, 1743 - 1805
He could number among his patrons the King of Spain, and the heir to the Prussian Throne, and he composed around one hundred string quartets, and at least as many quintets, amongst other works - this week Donald Macleod looks at the life and music of Luigi Boccherini. Although Boccherini was originally born in the Tuscan city of Lucca, he spent the majority of his life as a working musician in Spain, after a brief spell in Paris. His extensive output is largely now forgotten, but one work in particular, the Minuet from his fifth String Quartet opus 11, is one of the most used entry points by film and TV producers today, creating a sense of eighteenth century elegance and period. Boccherini is also credited with forming the first ever string quartet, yet despite his popularity during much of his lifetime, Boccherini lived at the end of his life in virtual poverty, seeing his wife and daughters die one after another, before his own death possibly from tuberculosis.