The music on this recording comes from the Viennese Classical world in which Mauro Giuliani played a full part.

Born in Italy, he came to Vienna around the year 1806 and immediately made a great impression there. He did not merely play solo music, but performed continually with other musicians; with Moscheles the pianist, Mayseder the violinist, Hummel and many others. He is even said to have performed - perhaps playing the cello - in the first performance of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony in Vienna in 1813.

Giuliani's compositions were not only for the solo guitar; very many of them were for guitar with other instruments, and this recording presents three of them. There are in all about 22 surviving works by Giuliani for guitar with flute or violin, ranging from full-scale virtuoso duos to easy works for beginners. All of them show a full grasp of the nature and capabilities not only of his own instrument, the guitar but also of the other instruments.

It may be mentioned too, that he composed and arranged hundreds of songs with guitar and piano accompaniment.