The album title 'Hasse RELOADED' aims to challenge the prejudice against 18th-century court music as artificial and dusty.
Romain Rolland, in 1922, called the oblivion into which Hasse had fallen "one of the worst examples of historical injustice."
Valer Barna-Sabadus, the countertenor on this album, was drawn to Hasse's music by its blend of Handelian drama and Vivaldi's instrumental virtuosity.
Johann Adolph Hasse, a highly celebrated composer in his lifetime, was affectionately called 'il caro sassone' (the dear Saxon) by Italians.
Hasse's setting of Metastasio's Didone abbandonata premiered in 1742 at the Hubertusburg Hunting Castle for the Dresden court's inner circle.
The Johann Adolph Hasse Society of Munich, founded in 1986, is dedicated to revitalizing Hasse's extensive but largely unknown musical works.
Hasse, born in 1699 near Hamburg, was a pupil of the renowned Alessandro Scarlatti and moved to Naples in 1722.
