Johann Joseph Fux

Suite C major

Flute in C
Oboe
Clarinet in Bb
Horn in Eb/F
Bassoon (Basson)

Johann Joseph Fux (1660 - 1741), known as a music theorist and Kapellmeister of three emperors in Vienna, created an extensive oeuvre: a large number of church music works (masses, requiems, vespers, psalms, etc.).), oratorios, operas and instrumental music, only a small part of which appeared in print.

His collection 'Concento musico-instrumentalis', dedicated to Emperor Joseph I, appeared in print in Nuremberg in 1701; the volume contains 7 partitas (orchestral suites), each with a fluctuating number of individual movements, scored for strings, oboes, bassoon, and occasionally flauto and clarino.

In order to make J.J. Fux's instrumental works accessible to a wider public, individual movements were assembled into 'suites'. In the selection, attention was paid to the possibility of cyclic performance. Other considerations were that the melodic formations should have as high an affinity as possible to wind music and that the keys of the individual movements should be identical or related. The movements were originally conceived for four or five voices; occasionally the fifth voice was added in motivic alignment on the basis of the figured basso continuo. The original notation shows hardly any rules for articulation; individual slurs were added analogously. Some suggestions are made for the dynamic execution of the individual movements, but these must by no means be regarded as binding. The indicated metronome numbers can also serve as orientation.

May the pieces serve to make the unfortunately often forgotten compositional work of Fux known in a new form and to recall it again.

Klaus Winkler