King Frederick the Great's Flute Book

Reporting from Potsdam in 1773, the English musical amateur Charles Burney wrote the following about the Flötenbuch Friedrichs des Grossen: On the table a book of manuscript Solfeggi, as his majesty calls them. His majesty has books of this kind, for the use of his flute, in the music room of every one of his palaces.

Though mentioned repeatedly in secondary literature since then, the music book only became available once again in 1934, when Erwin Schwarz-Reiflingen compiled the present selection. It comprises 100 short practice pieces arranged according to keys. While a small number of pieces can be attributed to Johann Joachim Quantz, the majority were written by the King himself.

Since Quantz famous instructional work Versuch einer Anweisung die Flöte traversiere zu spielen contains almost no practice pieces, the Flötenbuch Friedrichs der Großen offers an ideal performance-practical access to the flute music of Quantz and his circle.