the most important member of a German family of musicians of Italian ancestry. Although Danzi was a prolific composer of operas, church music, lieder, symphonies, and concerti, it is for his chamber music, particularly for woodwind ensemble, that he is best known.

Danzi studied the cello with his Italian-born father, and by age 15 he was playing in the famous Mannheim orchestra. In 1790 he married the singer Margarethe Marchand, with whom he toured successfully as a conductor. At his wife's death in 1800 he retired, but in 1807 he accepted the appointment of kapellmeister in Stuttgart, where he supported and influenced the work of the much younger Carl Maria von Weber (Weber, Carl Maria von). He went to Karlsruhe to fill a similar post in 1812.