The viol (also known as the viola da gamba) is any one of a family of bowed, fretted and stringed musical instruments developed in the mid-late 15th century and used primarily in the Renaissance and Baroque periods. The viol family is related to and descends primarily from the Renaissance vihuela, a plucked instrument that preceded the guitar. Viols are different in several respects from instruments of the violin family.

Vihuelists began playing their flat-edged instruments with a bow in the second half of the 15th century. Within two or three decades, this led to the evolution of an entirely new and dedicated bowed string instrument that retained many of the features of the original plucked vihuela: a flat back, sharp waist-cuts, frets, thin ribs (initially), and an identical tuning—hence its original name, vihuela de arco; arco is Spanish for "bow".

An influence in the playing posture has been credited to the example of Moorish rabab players.

Viols most commonly had six strings, although many 16th-century instruments had five or even four strings. Viols were (and are) strung with gut strings of lower tension than on the members of the violin family, let alone the steel strings mostly used there today. Gut strings produce a sonority far different from steel, the former generally described as softer and sweeter. Around 1660, gut or silk core strings overspun with copper wire first became available; these were then used for the lowest-pitched bass strings on viols, and on many other string instruments as well.

Marin Marais (31 May 1656, Paris – 15 August 1728, Paris) was a French composer and viol player. He studied composition with Jean-Baptiste Lully, often conducting his operas, and with master of the bass viol Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe for 6 months. He was hired as a musician in 1676 to the royal court of Versailles. He did quite well as court musician, and in 1679 was appointed "ordinaire de la chambre du roy pour la viole", a title he kept until 1725.

He was a master of the basse de viol, and the leading French composer of music for the instrument. He wrote five books of 'Pièces de viole' (1686-1725) for the instrument, generally suites with basso continuo. These were quite popular in the court, and for these he was remembered in later years as he who "founded and firmly established the empire of the viol" (Hubert Le Blanc, 1740). His other works include a book of Pièces en trio (1692) and four operas (1693-1709), Alcyone (1706) being noted for its tempest scene.

Titon du Tillet included Marais in Le Parnasse françois, making the following comments on two of his pieces, Le Labyrinthe, perhaps inspired by the labyrinth of Versailles, and La Gamme:

Carolus Hacquart (alternative name: Carel Hacquart) was a composer, born c. 1640 in Bruges, in present-day Belgium.

Hacquart received his education, comprising Latin and composition as well as viola da gamba, lute and organ, most probably in his native town. Attracted by the growth of musical life of the rich citizens of the United Provinces, he moved with his brother Philip to Amsterdam in the early 1670s where both gained a living as free-lance musicians. He moved in 1679 to The Hague, where he taught and organized concerts with the support of the elderly Constantijn Huygens, who was the chief councillor of William III, the future king of England. Thanks to Constantijn Huygens' recommendation of Hacquart to stadtholder Maurice of Nassau, Prince of Orange, Hacquart could organise weekly concerts in the famous Mauritshuis. Hacquart was also an organist at the Old-Catholic church of The Hague.

To earn a living, Hacquart gave music classes to many wealthy patricians such as lawyers and other notables who made music in their spare time. One of his students was Willem Hoogendorp, the future mayor of Rotterdam to whom he dedicated his sonatas Harmonia Parnassia. In 1686 Hacquart composed 12 suites under the title Chelys which he dedicated to two of his students, the lawyers Pittenius and Kuysten.

Opus III were an English techno and house music group who had success on the UK Singles Chart and on the U.S. Dance charts. The group consisted of vocalist Kirsty Hawkshaw and producers/musicians Kevin Dodds, Ian Munro and Nigel Walton. The group members promoted a strong environmental message through their lyrics, album liner notes and photo and video imagery.

Their debut album, Mind Fruit, produced the track "It's a Fine Day", a cover of a 1983 single by Jane, which topped the U.S. Hot Dance Club Play chart in 1992 and reached number five on the UK Singles Chart.

The song, now considered a house music classic, is the basis of Orbital's 1992 track "Halcyon" and its album version "Halcyon + On + On" included in their second eponymous album; the "la la la" section of the "It's A Fine Day" chorus was backmasked and sampled throughout the song. Norwegian artist Erlend Øye also covered the song on his album that was part of the DJ-Kicks series.

Hawkshaw returned the favour by appearing in the video for "Halcyon" playing a housewife who was 'under the influence'. The other single release from Mind Fruit, was "I Talk To The Wind" a cover of the 1969 song by King Crimson. This was not a big chart success in the UK, only reaching number 52.

Carl Friedrich Abel (22 December 1723 – 20 June 1787) was a German composer of the Classical era. (The Chambers Biographical Dictionary gives his year of birth erroneusly as 1725.) He was a fine player of the viola da gamba, and composed important music for that instrument.

Abel was born in Köthen, the son of Christian Ferdinand Abel, the principal viola da gamba and cello player in the court orchestra. Johann Sebastian Bach was director of the orchestra until 1723 when he moved to Leipzig. It was on Bach's recommendation that in 1748 he was able to join Johann Adolph Hasse's court orchestra at Dresden where he remained for ten years. In 1759 (or 1758 according to Chambers), he went to England and became chamber-musician to Queen Charlotte. He gave a concert of his own compositions in London, performing on various instruments, one of which was a five-string cello known as a pentachord, which had been recently invented by John Joseph Merlin.

In 1762, Johann Christian Bach, the eleventh son of J.S. Bach, joined him in London, and the friendship between him and Abel led, in 1764 or 1765, to the establishment of the famous Bach-Abel concerts, England's first subscription concerts. In those concerts, many celebrated guest artists appeared, and many works of Haydn received their first English performance.