Had Georg Philipp Telemann been born three centuries later he would surely have taken to social media like the proverbial duck to water. An enthusiastic and early adopter of the newest innovations right across the board, was there a composer more adept at networking, manipulating the system, or keeping himself and his music in the public eye? This was not out of vanity or an overweening ego – though as his three autobiographical sketches reveal, he was not a man to hide his light under a bushel. Largely self-taught (or so he claimed), Telemann simply wanted to reach out to the widest constituency in order to share his expertise, open-mindedness and enthusiasm. As well as the autobiographies, the running commentaries by letter or pithy verse and the copious self-published collections – engraved by himself using the latest state-of-the-art equipment – he led from the front. Impresario, church music director, opera house intendant, musical newspaper publisher, unstuffy pedagogue and unstoppable proselytiser for...