Giovanni Battista Sammartini

[2] Sammartini is especially associated with the formation of the concert symphony through both the shift from a brief opera-overture style and the introduction of a new seriousness and use of thematic development that prefigure Haydn and Mozart.

[1] He is sometimes confused with his elder brother, Giuseppe, a composer with a similarly prolific output though not equal renown or influence who ended up in the service of Frederick, Prince of Wales.

Giovanni Battista Sammartini was born to French emigrant and oboist Alexis Saint-Martin and Girolama de Federici in Milan, in what was Habsburg-ruled Lombardy during most of his lifetime and is Italy today.

Although he was highly regarded in his time, his music was soon forgotten, and it was not rediscovered until 1913, by researchers Fausto Torrefranca, Georges de Saint-Foix and Gaetano Cesari.

[5] His approach to symphonic composition was unique in that it drew influence from the trio sonata and concerto forms, in contrast to other composers during the time that modeled symphonies after the Italian overture.