Album Notes

Austrian composer, his father and grandfather were officials in the Imperial Court in Vienna. His musical training seems initially to have been the sort of instruction every higher class person got in the course of education, but when he was a teenager he started to compose and received more advanced keyboard instruction from the organist at St. Michael's Church in Vienna. Became a favorite pupil of the Vienna court's Kapellmeister, Johann Joseph Fux. For theory,harpsichord,cembalo and composition .At the same time he studied with Matteo Palotta and Gottlieb Muffat. After three years, Fux enthusiastically recommended him and Wagenseil obtained the post of composer to the court and kept that job until he died. Wagenseil was nominated the Viennese imperial court Kapellmeister, he was court composer from 1738 and also organist to Empress Marie Therèse (1741-50) and keyboard master to the imperial archduchesses.
Between his keyboard students was Marie- Antoinette who played the harp.
Wagenseil was the composer of transition between the baroque and the classical Wien style. At the same time he was also a virtuoso keyboard player.