the size of the Hofkapelle, particularly the number of instruments used by the court and the number of court musicians who could pay more than one instrument, but also dramatically shrank the importance of the Kapellknaben to the point where only two were employed by the court. This growth happened in spite of the ongoing War of the Spanish Succession and even Villars's invasion of the Duchy in 1707 (which caused the Ducal family to temporarily flee to Switzerland) finally ended in 1709 when the Duke, increasingly short on cash because of the war and the construction of Ludwigsburg Palace, issued a massive retrenchment that dramatically shrank the Hofkapelle. This strain would still be felt in 1714, and Pez commented: Despite its small size and financial strain, Pez was still very proud of the quality of his instrumentalists, however he worried about his vocalists, who were not numerous and contained many Catholic members who would at times not be present, exacerbating the problem. Württemberg, unlike other Lutheran German courts, found a semi-solution to a shortage of treble voices in the hiring of a succession of young, unmarried called Legr-Discantistinnen or Kapelleknaben (despite the masculinity of the term) who would receive music training with the expectation that they would become permanent members of the Württemberg establishment with an equal salary to the choirboys. It is also likely that female vocalists formed part of a French comödianten from 1713 to 1716 in a nod to the large-scale theatrical performances of the early days that the Duke called off and never returned to because of the vast amounts of money lost in the stay of Johann Sigismund Kusser in Stuttgart, and Pez (according to his own word) was required to practice with and compose for this group for many hours. This group would perform in the celebrations of the Duke's hunting order, founded in 1702 and named after St. Hubert, that became one of the most important events in court life as the 18th century moved ahead, with Pez and the various components of the participating Hofkapelle lodged in and around Ludwigsburg Palace. By the second decade of the 18th century, the Singballete and operas used to celebrate previous ducal birthdays had been replaced with smaller presentations. This coincided with the shift of opinion in the court as to what extent chamber music () was able to portray a ruler's wealth and sophistication