Francesco Barsanti

Francesco Barsanti (1690–1775) was an Italian flautist, oboist and composer. He was born in 1690 in the Tuscan city of Lucca, but spent most of his life in London and Edinburgh. Biography Very little is known about Barsanti’s background. His father may or may not have been the opera librettist Giovanni Nicolao Barsanti (Il Temistocle ) but this has never been proven. He studied law in Padua as a young man, but abandoned it to pursue a career in music. In 1714 Barsanti emigrated to London with Francesco Geminiani, another musician from Lucca who was several years his senior. He played oboe and recorder, and soon obtained a post in the opera orchestra at the Haymarket where Handel’s operas were being produced. Nerici reports that he returned briefly to Lucca in 1717 and again in 1718 to play in the Festival of the Holy Cross, ‘for a very high salary.’ According to Hawkins and other authorities, in 1735 Barsanti left London for Edinburgh in Scotland where he obtained a post as a ‘Master’ with the Edinburgh Musical Society. He stayed in Scotland for eight years, during which time he benefitted from the support (moral if not financial) of the young Lady Erskine (Charlotte Hope) (1720-17