Johann Adolf Hasse is primarily known as an opera composer and as the husband of the soprano Faustina Bordoni. He was educated in Italy and became famous there as "divino Sassone". The most important milestone in his career was the Dresden court of the Elector of Saxony - the court orchestra there became one of Europe's foremost ensembles during Hasse's thirty-year term of office.

Hasse's significance as an opera composer, however, has distorted our view of the fact that he was also a highly adept harpsichordist. He wrote four harpsichord sonatas for the Dauphine of France, Maria Josepha of Saxony, during a journey to Paris in 1750. Although they were never published, copies of these works enabled them to gain wide currency throughout Europe.

Together with less well-known harpsichord works of Hasse, the harpsichordist Luca Guglielmi is introducing these four royal sonatas of Hasse on CD for the first time.

Guglielmi performs regularly in the world's major concert halls, working together with Jordi Savall and his ensembles Le Concert des Nations and Hesperion XXI, amongst others. He is documented on over 50 CD and DVD productions as a soloist or in ensembles.