The cello concerto by Austrian composer & contrabass virtuoso Johann Matthias Sperger gets its first modern performance

Schloss Ludwigslust where Johann Matthias Sperger was based from 1789 until his death (Photo: Matthias Süßen – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Johann Matthias Sperger (1750-1812) was a name that was new to me. He was a distinguished Austrian contrabass virtuoso and composer with a significant body of work to his name. Born in Feldsburg in what was then Austria but is now Valtice in the Czech Republic, his name may well originally have been Jan Matyáš Sperger.

He studied in Vienna and may have been a pupil of Albrechtsberger. From 1777 he worked for the Archbishop of Pressburg (now Bratislava). He then went on extended concert tours that made him famous as a contrabass virtuoso and composer, both at home and abroad. In 1789 the court of Archduke Friedrich Franz I in Ludwigslust (a Baroque palace some 40km south of Schwerin) appointed Sperger to the position of principal contrabass in the Mecklenburg-Schwerin Court orchestra, where he remained the rest of his life.

Sperger produced some forty symphonies and numerous instrumental concertos, including eighteen for double bass. There is a chance to hear one on 23 February at Kings Place when Leon Bosch directs The Hanover Band in the first modern performance of Sperger’s Cello Concerto in C with soloist Sebastian Comberti in a programme that also includes Cimarosa’s Oboe Concerto (with soloist Geoff Coates) and symphonies by Haydn and Mozart.

Full details from Kings Place website.