Franz Krommer was born František Vincenc Kramář at Kamenice on 27 November 1759, the son of an innkeeper; the family used the Germanised form of the name and moved to Třebíč in 1773. From 1773 to 1776 he studied violin and organ with his uncle Antonín Mattias Kramář at Tuřany, becoming organist there alongside him in 1777. He moved to Vienna in 1785 and then to Simontornya in Hungary as violinist and later Kapellmeister to the orchestra of the Count of Limburg Stirum, was appointed choirmaster at Pécs Cathedral in 1790, and became Kapellmeister to Count Anton II Grassalkovich in 1793. He returned to Vienna in 1795 and became maestro di cappella to Duke Ignaz Fuchs in 1798. He died in Vienna on 8 January 1831 at seventy-one.

In 1818 he succeeded Leopold Koželuch as Kapellmeister and court composer to Francis I, the first Emperor of Austria, and held the post until his death; Carl Engel suggested he may have been in it as early as 1814. He was among the most popular composers in Vienna in the early nineteenth century, working alongside Beethoven, whom he knew. His published output runs to at least three hundred works across a hundred and ten opus numbers — nine or more symphonies, some seventy string quartets, about fifteen string quintets, and a large body of music for wind ensemble. What is played today is chiefly the clarinet concertos, including the concerto for two clarinets.

Sources:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Krommer
• https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q698047