Not much is known about Sebastiano Moratelli’s life, and his entire oeuvre, which is supposed to have included a number of operas and serenades, until recently was thought to have been lost. The rediscovery of the score of La “faretra smarrita” in the library of the Counts of Toerring-Jettenbach therefore amounts to a sensation. It finally allows us to form an impression of Moratelli’s compositional capabilities in their mature stage and of the “expressive power and naturalness” of his music so greatly esteemed by his contemporaries.

Moratelli, who came from Italy to Vienna before 1660, served as imperial chamber music director and music teacher to the Archduchess Anna Maria Josepha. On her marriage to Johann Wilhelm, Moratelli went along to Düsseldorf in 1679 and remained a member of the court there until his death.

Musicians of today remember Pepusch mainly as the author or arranger of the songs in Gay’s Beggar’s Opera, that romping persiflage of English society and its love of Italian opera which was such a success in 1728 that Handel was forced as a result to close his opera-academy. Johann Christoph Pepusch was born in Berlin in 1667, the son of a Protestant pastor. At the early age of fourteen he entered the service of the Prussian court, remaining until he gave his notice at the age of 30 (1698).