Very little is known today about the personal life of composer Antonio Salieri, if only because he left very few private documents to posterity. An autobiography of the composer, presented to the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde among other papers by his grandson Eduard Rumfeld in 1865, is lost. To learn more of Salieri, then, it is necessary to refer to sources such as diaries and letters by close friends. One rewarding source has proved to be the diary of Joseph Rosenbaum, who married the daughter of Salieri's teacher Florian Leopold Gassmann and was on friendly terms with the artist for many years.

This recording seeks to bring us closer to Salieri the man - with works that he composed for performance among friends. They show the composer in quite a different light from the operatic works that he wrote to enhance the prestige of the Viennese court.