As a great admirer of French culture and savoir vivre Frederic II. preferred speaking French to German. When he visited the court in Dresden as crown prince Pierre-Gabriel Buffardin gave him a transverse flute and he was devoted to the instrument for the rest of his life. As nobody played it better than the French, he would have loved to see Michel Blavet at his court, but the latter chose to stay in Paris. Instead Frederic was trained by Johann Joachim Quantz, who also composed exclusively for him. Master flautist François Lazarevitch and his ensemble have taken music from the three flute legends as well as compositions by some of their court composer colleagues and created a program, which beautifully illustrates the artistic exchange between Paris and Prussia. By the way, back then the French used to call the transverse flute "la flûte allemande". The German flute.