Christian Gottlob Hubert

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Christian Gottlob Hubert (born May 3, 1714 in Fraustadt (today Wschova), Kingdom of Poland , died February 16, 1793 in Ansbach ) is a keyboard instrument maker who came to Germany from Poland. He worked particularly in the Brandenburg principalities of Bayreuth and Ansbach.

Life

Transverse fortepiano from 1787 in the Germanisches Nationalmuseum , Nuremberg

Nothing is known about the education of Christian Gottlob Hubert, the second son of the baker Christian Hubert. Based on the findings of Hubert's instruments, the musicologist Franz Krautwurst considered it possible that the Saxon instrument maker Gottfried Silbermann had influenced Hubert's way of working as a model. In recent research, however, it is certain that he was not a direct student of Silbermann.

According to the historical literature cited, Hubert came to the Brandenburg-Franconian Margraviate of Bayreuth in 1740 , where soon after 1760 he acquired the title of court organ and instrument maker . According to its signature, the bound clavichord exhibited in the Bayreuth Historical Museum belongs to the time before his court employment.

"Christian. Thank god. Hubert [/] organ: et. Instrument maker in Bayreuth fecit. Ao: 1756 "

How his relationship with the Bayreuth margrave couple Friedrich and Wilhelmine , who were well versed in all arts , was in part unclear. According to the parish register, the daughter of a Bayreuth court shopkeeper became his wife on February 7, 1748, which is his earliest written record in the margrave city. That year he built the organ of the hospital church on the market. A list from December 1758 of Wilhelmine's clavecins left after her death in 1758 contains, within a collection of 11 instruments from Berlin, Leipzig, Nuremberg and Dresden, a small clavecin with 2 registers by Hubert , which stood in the bedroom (the margravine) and one by Hubert without more detailed description at Mons: Stephanini , the court singer Stefano Leonardo, but which Sr. Königl. Highnesses have geschenckt . His signature of a Bayreuth clavichord from 1763 describes him as a Hoff organ and instrument maker in Bayreuth ; so he now had a direct connection to the court. In 1769 he worked again in the Margraviate on the implementation of an organ in Bindlach . In addition, he worked again in Bayreuth in 1772.

Because in 1749 he got into a dispute over competence with two Brandenburg-Kulmbach organ builders Johann Jakob Graichen and Johann Nikolaus Ritter - both pupils of Gottfried Silbermann - Hubert built mainly stringed keyboard instruments from then on . After the death of the last Bayreuth margrave in 1768, he and the Bayreuth court orchestra moved to Ansbach, where he worked well into old age. Johann Wilhelm Hoffmann (1764–1809), who was Hubert's employee from 1789, continued the workshop after his death.

Create

Replica of a Hubert clavichord (Ansbach, 1789) in the Organeum , Weener

Only two new organs by Hubert are proven. The small organ for the Bayreuth Spitalkirche am Markt from 1748 comprised five stops on one manual. The carving by Johann Gabriel Räntz bears the monogram FMZB (Friedrich Markgraf zu Bayreuth) and the year 1748. It is unusual that the upper cornices of the pedal towers are curved inwards. In 1780/1781 Hubert created a single-manual organ for the Catholic Prayer House in Ansbach with ten registers.

From his numerous piano productions in Ansbach, instruments, mainly clavichords, have survived worldwide . Hubert is sure to be the builder of two pianos . Fortepiano and harpsichord are not preserved. Several of the Hubert instruments are lost to war. The preserved clavichords can be assigned to three construction phases: In the early phase from 1756 to 1763 (in Bayreuth), small bound instruments (C – f 3 ) with bodies made of stained spruce and slotted keys were made. In the following years Hubert built veneered clavichords, theirs Key levers are guided by lateral pins. The instruments of the 1770s are fretless and have a larger keyboard range (F 1 –f 3 ). In the 1780s Hubert returned to the tied clavichords with a smaller circumference (C – g 3 , more rarely (A 1 –f 3 ). Four instruments from 1782 and 1784 are made with a reinforcing double-layer bottom.

List of works

  • The small organ, which Hubert built for the Bayreuth Spitalkirche in 1748, was moved to the Bayreuth cemetery church in 1850, redesigned several times over the years and in 1929 by a new work by GF Steinmeyer & Co. with a new action mechanism and a new console replaced. The rococo prospectus was included in the new building.
  • Hubert's organ from 1780/1781 for the Catholic Church in Ansbach (I / 10) was transferred to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bettwar in the 1830s and has been preserved.
  • In Wilhelmine's estate there were eleven clavecins (only this term in the heading), including two by Hubert, which are now lost; although it is not known whether the French term clavecin means harpsichord or fortepiano. However, there is also the term clavier in this list .
  • Of the 18 clavichords that have been preserved, the oldest dates from 1756 from the Bayreuth period. It is kept by the Bayreuth Historical Museum .
  • Only two authentic pianos have survived, which have a simple push mechanism in the style of contemporary English instruments. A richly decorated transverse fortepiano from 1785, originally in the Heyer collection, came to the Rück Collection, Nuremberg, which is now in the Germanic National Museum in Nuremberg.
  • Also from the Rück collection comes a Hubertian square piano from 1787 in very good condition, which is exhibited today in the Germanic National Museum.
  • A fortepiano from 1776 was privately owned in Erlangen.
  • The Neupert Collection, Bamberg, the Basel Historical Museum , the State Institute for Music Research Berlin, the Goethe Museum Frankfurt, the Handel House in Halle, the German Museum Munich, the Art History Museum Vienna and the Albert Ludwig University have owned or still own other instruments, especially clavichords Freiburg and the city of Würzburg .
  • In addition, instruments from Hubert made it to New York , Edinburgh and Liverpool .

literature

  • Margaret Cranmer: Hubert, Christian Gottlob. In: Stanley Sadie (Ed.): The New Grove . Volume 8. Macmillan, London 1980, ISBN 0-333-23111-2 , p. 757.
  • Hubert Henkel:  Hubert, Christian Gottlob. In: Ludwig Finscher (Hrsg.): The music in past and present . Second edition, personal section, volume 9 (Himmel - Kelz). Bärenreiter / Metzler, Kassel et al. 2003, ISBN 3-7618-1119-5 , Sp. 453–455 ( online edition , subscription required for full access)
  • Franz Krautwurst:  Hubert, Christian Gottlob. In: Friedrich Blume (Hrsg.): The music in past and present (MGG). First edition, Volume 6 (Head - Jenny). Bärenreiter / Metzler, Kassel et al. 1957, DNB 550439609 , Sp. 816–819, therein detailed information on the historical literature and the instruments.
  • Wolfgang Strack: Christian Gottlob Hubert and his instruments. In: The Galpin Society Journal, Vol. 32, May 1979, pp. 38-58, JSTOR 841535 .
  • Koen Vermeij: The Hubert Clavichord Data Book. A Description of All Extant Clavichords by Christian Gottlob Hubert, 1714–1793. Clavichord International Press, Bennebroek 2000, ISBN 90-73029-10-4 .

Sound recordings

Web links

Commons : Christian Gottlob Hubert  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Hubert Henkel:  Hubert, Christian Gottlob. In: Ludwig Finscher (Hrsg.): The music in past and present . Second edition, personal section, volume 9 (Himmel - Kelz). Bärenreiter / Metzler, Kassel et al. 2003, ISBN 3-7618-1119-5 , Sp. 453–455, here: Sp. 453.
  2. ↑ Irene Hegen: Wilhelmines abandoned pianos. In: Peter Niedermüller, Reinhard Wiesend (Hrsg.): Music and theater at the court of the Bayreuth Margravine Wilhelmine (= writings on musicology, volume 7). Are Edition, Mainz 2002, ISBN 3-924522-08-1 , p. 45.
  3. ↑ See Strack p. 50.
  4. ^ Cranmer: Hubert, Christian Gottlob. 1980, p. 757.
  5. ^ A b Hermann Fischer, Theodor Wohnhaas: Historical organs in Upper Franconia . Schnell & Steiner, Munich 1985, ISBN 3-7954-0385-5 , pp. 70 .
  6. ↑ a b Hubert Henkel:  Hubert, Christian Gottlob. In: Ludwig Finscher (Hrsg.): The music in past and present . Second edition, personal section, volume 9 (Himmel - Kelz). Bärenreiter / Metzler, Kassel et al. 2003, ISBN 3-7618-1119-5 , Sp. 453–455, here: Sp. 454.
  7. ^ Koen Vermeij: The Hubert Clavichord Data Book. A Description of All Extant Clavichords by Christian Gottlob Hubert, 1714–1793. Clavichord International Press, Bennebroek 2000, ISBN 90-73029-10-4 .
  8. ^ Strack: Christian Gottlob Hubert and his instruments. 1979, pp. 48-49, 57-58.
  9. ↑ This is now housed in the Museum for Musical Instruments at the University of Leipzig .
  10. ^ Collection Rück, Nuremberg
  11. ^ For details of the instruments see Strack, 1979, pp. 48–58, and Henkel, 2003, col. 454.
  12. ^ Table of contents of the CD on the website of the Concerto label , accessed on October 14, 2011.
personal data
SURNAME Hubert, Christian Gottlob
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German keyboard instrument maker
DATE OF BIRTH May 3, 1714
PLACE OF BIRTH Woman city
DATE OF DEATH February 16, 1793
Place of death Ansbach