GIOVANNI GIUSEPPE CAMBINI TROIS QUINTETTI CONCERTANS for Flute, Oboe, Clarinet, Horn, and Bassoon No. 1 in Bb major Allegro maestoso, Larghetto cantabile, Rondo Allegretto grazioso No. 2 in D minor Allegro espressivo, Larghetto sostenuto ma con moto, Presto ma non tanto No. 3 in F major Allegro maestoso, Larghetto sostenuto, Rondo Allegro con brio THE SONI VENTORUM WIND QUINTET FELIX SKOWRONEK, flute LAILA STORCH, oboe WILLIAM McCOLL, clarinet CHRISTOPHER LEUBA, horn ARTHUR GROSSMAN, bassoon Giovanni Giuseppe Cambini (1746-1825) The most widely accepted biographical information concerning Giovanni Giuseppe Cambini has been the data collected by the Belgian musicologist F. J. Fetis in his "Biographie universelle des musiciens" (Brussels, 1875). The narrative is notable for a number of bizarre incidents that befell Cambini, and the story related is essentially the following. Born in Livorno, Italy, in 1746, Cambini began violin study at an early age and apparently reached a high level of accomplishment by his teens. During this period he became probably became acquainted with the string quartet by playing in a group that included violinists Pietro Nardini and Filippo Manfredi as well as composer-cellist Luigi Boccherini. If so, this early association may have had effects on Cambini's subsequent importance as a composer. At the age of seventeen he went to Bologna for a three-year period of study with the famed counterpoint instructor Padre Martini. A visit to Naples followed, but while on a sea voyage homeward his ship was seized by Barbary pirates, and Cambini escaped slavery only through ransom paid by a rich Venetian merchant. Fetis account next finds Cambini in Paris around 1770 where he was befriended by the composer Franois Joseph Gossec and introduced into the musical life of the French capital. In the course of the next thirty years Cambini acquired fame and some fortune as a violinist and composer. From the beginning, he quickly assessed the musical preferences of Parisian audiences, and his compositional facility enabled him to produce numerous works in all forms, including opera and ballet. Later, his adjustment to the demands of the French Revolution was readily accomplished with similar ease, resulting in an array of patriotic songs and airs, often with wind instrument accompaniment. After 1800, however, accounts of Cambini and his music become increasingly scarce. Fetis recounts that, in order to sustain himself, Cambini wrote articles for a musical journal and also resorted to hack work and to passing off arrangements in the style of others. His circumstances steadily worsened, and after 1812 details of his existence seem to be mere speculation or hearsay. One source has him in Holland by this time, dead, while another commits him in 1815 to a poorhouse outside Paris where, it is said, he ended his misery ten years later by taking poison. These quintets were dedicated to Xaver Lefevre, professor of clarinet at the Paris Conservatoire and friend of Cambini. He was appointed to that position in 1797, and thus we assume that the quintets were written sometime within the next five years. The clarinet has a leading role throughout these quintets. The clarinette cadenza at the end of the slow movement of the Bb Major Quintet, is due to William McColl. Felix Skowronek