With this release of Filippo Ruge (1725-1767), Brilliant Classics brings another forgotten name from the Baroque era to the attention of record buyers: there is not another disc of his music in the catalogue, making this an indispensable purchase for all lovers of Italian Baroque. Ruge was a Roman by birth, and a flautist by training: hence the concentration in this survey of his output on works which feature the instrument in a soloistic capacity: not only a G major concerto and sonata but a D major duet, for two flutes, and an arietta in which a pair of sopranos is accompanied by a pair of flutes. The release is completed by a solo soprano aria and a dramatic three-movement sinfonia which concludes with the tone-painting of a violent storm. Ruge was highly regarded in his day, and the lively imagination at work in the pieces on this disc gives ample reason for such admiration. He became a solo flautist at the prestigious series of Concerts Spirituelles in Paris, and his Op.3 collection of concertos was published in London by John Walsh, who handled music by all the significant European composers of the day. After the publication of the set of Duets from which the present D major example is taken, Ruge vanishes from the records; his exact date and location of death are presently unknown. Leader of the Swiss-based Flatus Ensemble, Enrico Casularo also trained in Rome – at the Accademia di Santa Cecilia, where he is now a professor of Baroque flute – as a flautist, musicologist and organologist. He has played, recorded, studied and lectured on flute music of the Baroque era for international organisations and produced an authoritative treaty on the history of the transverse flute.