Hans Huber (1852-1921)

[Peter1953]

Currently I'm discovering and exploring the 8 Symphonies of Hans Huber, an almost forgotten Swiss composer. I love his PC's 1 and especially 3, but I can strongly recommend his Symphonies as well (the complete set of 5 CD's is now available at jpc for €54 excl. p&p). Every symphony is a listening adventure, and has beautiful passages and themes, sometimes with a solo instrument like the violin. Some are immediately appealing, like the 1st and 2nd, others have to grow on me. His Symphonies (and PC's) remind me hardly of others. Now and then I'm thinking of a mixture between Strauss and Sibelius, but certainly not Brahms (he's mentioned many times in the booklets, of course).
I think Sterling has done us a great favour with the release of Huber's Symphonies and two PC's. I understand Huber als wrote a VC and CC. If the complete scores are still around, who knows what we can expect in the near future.

What is your opinion?

[Alan Howe]

Oh dear. I'm afraid I find Huber's orchestral stuff rather a bore. His earlier music is his best, I think, but I just find that there's too much hearty beer and Swiss cheese in most of the symphonies. The Sterling performances make a good case for the music, but I'm not convinced...

Time for me to give the symphonies another listen, maybe?

[eschiss1]

There's also a lot of chamber music (mentioned by William Newman, some of it, in The Sonata Since Beethoven...) - some of it recorded (one of the piano quartets on LP, one of the piano quintets I think, one of the cello sonatas, but not too much more?) Again IMSLP has a lot of the scores.
Eric

[petershott@btinternet.com]

I've clearly missed out on the hearty beer and Swiss cheese in the Huber symphonies. For in them I find lots of buzzing energy that's not too far away from Dvorak and Elgar, and which I've never found in beer and cheese! Peter is also surely right to mention Sibelius and Strauss. To be sure, Huber isn't the complete master of the orchestra (I don't find myself gasping at the audacity and novelty of the orchestral writing in the way I do with the striking sound of Sibelius; nor glow with sheer pleasure at Strauss at his best [or being especially slick in the way only he can do]). But there is a firm grasp and control of formal development & progression of ideas in Huber that makes him a far superior composer than say Fritz Brun whose symphonies, despite some marvellous passages, often get bogged down in a wallow. So push to one side, Alan, the beer and cheese, and have another go at Huber. I find him a most satisfying composer and have been glad to discover his music - and hats off to Bo Hyttner for giving us excellent recordings of the symphonies. Wish we could hear more of the music, though, and especially the chamber music.

Peter

[Alan Howe]

Actually, I listened to most of Symphony No.1 yesterday and enjoyed it enormously - well up to, say, Stanford standards and very much 'Brahms plus' (nothing wrong with that!). On to No.2 today...

[Peter1953]

Thank you for your comments, Alan, Eric and Peter. Up to now I like the 2nd most of all, although the 1st and sunny 8th are very appealing as well. This morning I listened to the 4th, a curious work for strings, with a major role for a piano and very marginal role for an organ. Nevertheless I like the themes, although they are not that memorable. I have the impression that every symphony offers the listener something different. Interesting, but I cannot discover a typically Huber style.
I'm getting more and more impressed by his Piano Concertos. I'll guess the 3rd is the most interesting of the two, but the 1st offers hardly less memorable tunes. The 4th movement is a stunning finale. Just beautiful.
I wonder what the quality of Huber's chamber music is. Jpc offers two discs.

[Alan Howe]

I have enjoyed 1 and 2, but No.3 already feels inflated beyond Huber's means - rather too much cod-Wagner for my liking - so already indigestion is replacing enthusiasm. Where on earth is the music going? I'm afraid I can't hear (so far) any Sibelius or Strauss - the idiom is much more conservative (nothing much beyond Smetana or Dvorak, and unfortunately without their tunes!)

I just don't find Huber particularly interesting, but recognise that it may well be my fault. The comparison with Brun is, I think, unfair: the latter really belongs to the generation after Huber - it's a bit like comparing Stanford with Bantock. Still, I listen on...

[Peter1953]

I've listened to the 3rd for the 3rd time, and it definitely grows on me. The Trauermarsch is a beautiful, slow movement with a certain depth. I like the entrance of the soprano in the Finale, but the contribution to the whole work is marginal. No Sibelius or Strauss in this symphony (hints of those much greater composers in the later symphonies), but, (don't laugh at me) in the opening movement I must think of Berlioz and Franck, only for just a moment. It's a curious range of symphonies, and some passages are spicy, just like Swiss cheese... 

[eschiss1]

Moving my response from Martin Anderson's thread as it's more appropriate here ...

I'm guessing that the scores and parts of concerto 2 were only made available for hire, never as study scores (or else that somehow all those study scores were limited editions and lost, as has happened too- as when all radio tapes made of a broadcast, iirc, seem to have disappeared, or something like that...)

Always conceivable some real Huber-nut will try to reconstruct Huber concerto 4 from the reduction and the manuscript-remains as a labor of love, weirder things seem to be happening (I think I can think of examples.)  And concerto 2's score's disappearance, judging from even a quick skim of that reduction, does seem to be a real pity - it seems a thematically enjoyable and rich concerto-in-G. 

But yes, to that chamber music.  (Oh, I wasn't aware of the trio disc on Acte Prealable with the sonata/trio op. 135 for two violins and piano.  Missed that when summarizing the Huber chamber music recordings I knew of His organ fantasy on holy texts, in C minor, has been recorded once or twice; I know it from MIDIs I made.  I like that too.)

Hrm, this should be moved to the Huber thread. Doing so.

Eric

[FBerwald]

How many concertos did he write? I have the trwo piano concertos 1 & 3.

[eschiss1]

How many concertos did he write? I have the trwo piano concertos 1 & 3.

I believe there are 4 piano concertos (apparently no. 2 in G op.107, ca. 1891, is lost except for the 2-piano reduction and no. 4 in Bflat (pub. 1911) almost may as well be, too), a violin concerto and a cello concerto (I know nothing about those except that they are said to exist or have existed.)
Eric

[tokai]

I visit this site first time and for this reason i do not understand this topic Hans Huber . Please help me for understanding this.

[Gareth Vaughan]

How many concertos did he write? I have the trwo piano concertos 1 & 3.

I believe there are 4 piano concertos (apparently no. 2 in G op.107, ca. 1891, is lost except for the 2-piano reduction and no. 4 in Bflat (pub. 1911) almost may as well be, too), a violin concerto and a cello concerto (I know nothing about those except that they are said to exist or have existed.)
Eric

I think I recall Bo Hyttner telling me that the Full score and orchestral material of the 2nd PC of Huber is missing and that although there is extant a MS of the 4th PC it is in very poor condition with many pages missing so that reconstruction would take a long time and cost a lot of money, which is why Sterling have made no attempt (and have no plans) to try to reconstruct and record PCs 2 & 4.

[Gareth Vaughan]

Re. disappearance of orchestral material, etc., the full score may never have been published and it would be quite usual for the orchestral parts to remain in MS, only the 2-piano score for pianists to practise being printed. Such MS items got lost regularly. A similar fate seems to have been suffered by Stavenhagen 2; Siboni; Moscheles 8 and numerous others. Quite often the composer made only a "short score" (i.e for solo instrument and piano, the orchestral parts being indicated in the 2nd piano part) and would conduct from this - so a full score was never, in fact, produced. This was the case with many concertos before about 1860.
Where MS material is concerned we are frequently dependent on the relatives of the composer for preserving his/her materials. Far too often they have been cavalier and careless with these precious items, sometimes deeming them of no worth and actually destroying them!
I don't know if the Cello Concerto exists still, but Bayerische Staatsbibliothek has a copy of the Piano/Violin score of the Violin Concerto Op. 40 (as, I believe has Library of Congress). The score was published by Schott of Leipzig in 1879 so that publishing house may have a copy in their archives. The 4th PC was published by Hug of Leipzig. As you know, so much wonderful music was lost in the bombing raids on that city in WWII.

[FBerwald]

....... A similar fate seems to have been suffered by Stavenhagen 2; Siboni; Moscheles 8 and numerous others......

Dear Gareth could you shed some light on this "Siboni" please!??! I googled him with disastrous results.