Carl Friedrich Abel (1723-1787) - Prelude For Viola da gamba

Carl Friedrich Abel (22 December 1723 -- 20 June 1787) was a German composer of the Classical era. (The Chambers Biographical Dictionary gives his year of birth erroneusly as 1725.) He was a fine player of the viola da gamba, and composed important music for that instrument.

Abel was born in Köthen, the son of Christian Ferdinand Abel, the principal viola da gamba and cello player in the court orchestra of Johann Sebastian Bach. There is no proof that Abel studied at the Thomasschule Leipzig, but it was on Bach's recommendation that in 1748 he was able to join Johann Adolph Hasse's court orchestra at Dresden where he remained for ten years. In 1759 (or 1758 according to Chambers), he went to England and became chamber-musician to Queen Charlotte. He gave a concert of his own compositions in London, performing on various instruments, one of which was a five-string cello known as a pentachord, which had been recently invented by John Joseph Merlin.

In 1762, Johann Christian Bach, the eleventh son of J.S. Bach, joined him in London, and the friendship between him and Abel led, in 1764 or 1765, to the establishment of the famous Bach-Abel concerts, England's first subscription concerts. In those concerts, many celebrated guest artists appeared, and many works of Haydn received their first English performance.