Seixas and Soler Sonatas for Harpsichord

Keyboard music in the Iberian Peninsula during the first half of the eighteenth was dominated by three composers; Carlos Seixas (1704-1742), Padre Antonio Soler (1729-1783) and Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757). Scarlatti, an Italian, spent most of his life in the service of Princess Maria Barbara, daughter of King João V of Portugal. Following her marriage to Ferdinand VI of Spain, Scarlatti moved fi rst to Seville and then to Madrid remaining in loyal service for the rest of his life. These three composers were instrumental in the growth of the binary form sonata in the Iberian Peninsula which dominated harpsichord music to an even greater degree than the tiento in the previous two centuries.