Today’s date in 1803 marks the passing of a late Baroque composer who was born in Italy but spent most of his adult life in the Netherlands, where his works were published and distributed throughout Europe.

By the time of his death in The Hague at the age of 86, he had achieved fame as a composer, teacher, and concert organizer. But fame is a fickle thing, and his music remained all but forgotten until 1984, when his name caught the attention of the iconoclastic American rock musician Frank Zappa for the simple reason that this long-forgotten composer’s name happened to be FRANCESCO Zappa.

Now FRANK Zappa had achieved fame the 1960s and 70s as the iconoclastic founder of The Mothers of Invention and for releasing rock LPs with titles like “Freak Out,” and “Burnt Weenie Sandwich,” but in 1984 Frank Zappa released an album of Trio Sonatas by the long-forgotten Francesco Zappa, which the rock star himself performed on an electronic keyboard instrument called the Synclavier.

So was Francesco Zappa a long-lost ancestor of Frank Zappa? No, not really, but Frank Zappa liked surprising people, and his recording was a respectful, if electronically-realized, tribute to a long-forgotten composer who just happened to share his name.