Most of the greatest violinists in the 17th and 18th century were composers at the same time. Knowing exactly their own technical potential and specialties, but also their limitations, they could perfectly adapt their compositions to their personal demands and thus perform in the most convincing and stunning way, always leading the orchestra at the same time. With the orchestra Il pomo d’oro, the Russian virtuoso on the Baroque violin, Dmitry Sinkovsky, has already explored and recorded a representative selection of the repertory of Antonio Vivaldi (‘Concerti per Pisendel’ and ‘Concerti per due violini’). His new project together with Il pomo d’oro, “Virtuosissimo”, is a trip throughout Europe in the footsteps of some other great masters of the violin of the Baroque period.

Italy is represented by Giuseppe Tartini (1692-1770) and Pietro Antonio Locatelli (1695-1764), France by Jean-Marie Leclair (1697-1764) and Germany by Johann Georg Pisendel (1688-1755) and Georg Philipp Telemann (1681-1767). Telemann, however, was not a virtuoso on the violin himself, but composed a series of violin concerts for the then German ‘virtuoso assoluto’, Johann Georg Pisendel, concert master at the famous Dresden court orchestra, then the finest instrumental ensemble in Europe.