John Field Nocturne No.5 In Bb Major - Cantabile, assai Lento

John Field (26 July 1782 – 23 January 1837) was an Irish composer and pianist. He is best known for being the first composer to write nocturnes.

Field was born in Dublin in 1782, the eldest son of Protestant Irish parents. His father, Robert Field, earned his living by playing the violin in Dublin theatres. Field first studied the piano under his grandfather (also named John Field), who was a professional organist, and later under Tommaso Giordani. He made his debut at the age of nine, a performance that was well-received, on 24 March 1792 in Dublin^[1]. His family moved to Bath in 1793, and later that same year went to London. Field's father there secured for him an apprenticeship with the pianist and piano manufacturer Muzio Clementi. He attracted favourable comment from Joseph Haydn for his performances. By the time he was seventeen, Field had already premiered his First Piano Concerto (he wrote seven of them); it was one of the last acts of his apprenticeship. He was lionized as a performer for several years before turning to composition, beginning with his first set of piano sonatas, dedicated to Clementi, published in 1801.

In 1801 Field accompanied Clementi on a tour of Paris and Vienna (where he studied briefly with Johann Georg Albrechtsberger). When Clementi moved to Russia, Field followed him there, continuing his employment demonstrating his pianos. Field established his own concert career in Russia, and by 1806 was dividing his time between Moscow and Saint Petersburg, settling in the latter city after his marriage to a French woman in a Catholic ceremony in 1810. His teaching proved lucrative, and his lifestyle became somewhat extravagant; he was something of a bon vivant, and fathered an illegitimate son.

By 1831 his health deteriorated, and suffering from a painful cancer of the rectum he travelled back to London for medical attention. After treatment he returned to Russia by way of France (where, after first hearing one of Franz Liszt's performances on the keyboard, he asked his neighbour, "Does he bite?") and Italy, spending nine months in a hospital in Naples. Helped by a Russian aristocratic family, he returned to Moscow in 1835, and gave three concerts in Vienna en route, as a guest of Carl Czerny. In Moscow, he composed his last few nocturnes in the sixteen months remaining to him.

He died in Moscow two years later. Because Field's faith was unclear -- his parents were nominally Protestant, but he had had a Catholic wedding -- there is a legend that when he was questioned on his deathbed by a priest his friends had procured about which religion he practiced, he said, "I am a clavicist" (Je suis claveciste).

From Wiki http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Field_(composer)