Josef Fiala was a Czech composer and virtuoso oboist of the Classical period, born in Lochovice, Bohemia. His career took him through several European courts, including Munich, Salzburg—where he formed a friendship with Mozart—Vienna, Saint Petersburg in the service of Catherine the Great, and finally Donaueschingen from 1792. He specialized in wind music, composing concertos for oboe, English horn, flute, and other instruments alongside symphonies and chamber works, and he died in 1816.

Fiala’s friendship with Mozart, who admired his compositions and helped secure him a position in Salzburg, places him within the immediate circle of the Viennese Classical masters, and his concertos remain valued today as part of the relatively small repertoire for oboe and English horn from the period. His varied court appointments illustrate the itinerant career common to instrumentalist-composers of the late eighteenth century.

Sources:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Fiala