Hyperion Records

William Croft’s overture is a late example of a Purcellian trumpet sonata and was also written for a ceremonial occasion: to preface one of the odes he wrote on the occasion of the awarding of his DMus degree in the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford on 13 July 1713. Perhaps Handel knew it (it was published in the fine engraved score of the odes), for the opening is oddly similar to the beginning of the fugue of the Music for the Royal Fireworks.

from notes by Peter Holman © 1995