For five decades the court chapel master Christoph Graupner was the absolute ruler of the Darmstadt Court Orchestra’s musical realm. Compared with his more than 1,400 cantatas, operas, and other vocal works, his instrumental output was small, but it demonstrates that, like his friend Telemann, Graupner was a composer of the late baroque always searching for fresh expressive possibilities. In Graupner’s total of fifteen concertos, the transverse flute is the solo instrument; the violin was not his preferred solo medium. In his music the tonal element, the musical performance of a group, definitely occupied the foreground – which might also explain his frequent use of several solo instruments.