Francesco Santoliquido (1883-1971) was born in San Giorgio a Cremano in 1883, and graduated from the Rome Conservatory of Santa Cecilia in 1908. From 1912 to 1921 he settled in Tunisia, staying mainly in Hammamet where he began studying Arabic music. He wrote three operas, a ballet, orchestral and chamber works.

In Tunis, he founded a concert society and a music school that later became a conservatory. In 1933 he returned to Italy, he settled in Anacapri. His vast production includes theatrical works with an evident verista imprint and numerous symphonic compositions in which, in addition to his undoubted compositional mastery, a descriptive style not far from that of Ottorino Respighi also shines through.

This new recording presents the substantial Violin Sonata in A minor, a dramatic work in late-romantic style, several shorter pieces for violin and piano or cello and piano, and solo piano works, in rhapsodic and improvisational style, with fascinating oriental colors and timbres.

Played by the Gran Duo Italiano, Mauro Tortorelli (violin) and Angela Meluso (piano), who built a substantial and important discography with Brilliant Classics, presenting unjustly neglected composers like Rosario Scalero, Otokar Sevcik, Leopold Auer, Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco and Darius Milhaud.