Alessandro Poglietti

In the second half of the 17th century Poglietti settled in Vienna, where he attained an extremely high reputation, becoming one of Leopold I's favorite composers.

Poglietti held the post of court organist for 22 years from 1661 until his death during the Turkish siege that led into the Battle of Vienna.

[1][2] Another important connection of Poglietti's was with the Göttweig Benedictine Abbey, where he stayed as a guest a number of times, and where his only known opera was performed, in 1677.

The collection, which Poglietti presented to Leopold I and his wife Eleonor Magdalene, comprises the following works: Many of these pieces employ programmatic devices.

Poglietti also provided numerous examples of program music (which were incipits of possible pieces) in his performance and composition treatise Compendium oder kurtzer Begriff (1676).

Numerous pieces contain highly original treatments of the form: movements of the Binder Gigue from an A minor suite begin with repeated chords and include octave triplets in the left hand; the toccatas as well as any other piece may feature rapid modulations to completely foreign keys, highly contrasting sections and sections built on various kinds of repetition.