Hans Rosbaud

Hans Rosbaud (July 22, 1895 – December 29, 1962), was an Austrian conductor, particularly associated with the music of the twentieth century.

Hans Rosbaud was born in Graz, Austria. As children, Hans and his brother Paul Rosbaud performed with their mother, who taught piano. Hans continued studying music at the Hoch Conservatory in Frankfurt am Main, under the tutelage of Bernhard Sekles in composition and in piano.

Rosbaud's first professional post was in Mainz, starting in 1921, as the music director of the city's new School of Music, which included conducting the municipal symphony concerts. He became the first chief conductor of the Hessicher Rundfunk Symphony Orchestra (later the Hr-Sinfonieorchester) of Frankfurt in 1928. During the 1920s and 1930s, he presented premieres of works by Arnold Schoenberg and Béla Bartók. During the Nazi era, his freedom to present new music was restricted. In 1937, he became the general music director of the city of Münster. In 1941, Rosbaud took the same position in Strasbourg, heading the Orchestre philharmonique.

In 1945 he was named music director of the Munich Philharmonic by United States occupation authorities. In 1948, Rosbaud's contract with the Munich orchestra was allowed to lapse because the city authorities wanted to move the orchestra's repertoire in a conservative direction. That year Rosbaud became the first chief conductor of the South West German Radio Orchestra in Baden-Baden, where he remained for the rest of his life. In 1954, he conducted the first performance of Schoenberg's opera Moses und Aron at 8 days' notice; this performance was issued on a 1957 commercial recording for Philips. He regularly took the SWR Symphony Orchestra to festivals of contemporary music, such as at Donaueschingen. On December 6, 7, and 8, 1962, he concluded a six-week residency with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, leading Schumann's Piano Concerto with Eugene Istomin and Mahler's Ninth Symphony. He died less than a month later in Lugano, Switzerland on December 29.

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