HUBERT'S DESK

2022

• 2022 draws to a close ...

  Dear lovers of good music and good form, as we come to the end of a year that couldn't have been any more exciting, turbulent or shocking ...

• Dear Anna Netrebko ...

  I'm in complete agreement with you when you say that it is not the job of artists to take political positions, but instead to "unite people across political boundaries". Because that's what music can do! Because music is greater than politics ...

• The wreckage of socialism

  What is happening right now is the sad continuation of what Svetlana Alexievich describes in her book Secondhand Time: The Last of the Soviets ...

2021

• Blatant attacks on common sense

  "Rational government" - the Freedom Party (of all people!); "Organic or poison / Rationality or chaos" – the Greens and Armageddon; "Politics that think like you" – the New Austria and Liberal Forum, to whom are they referring? Not me, right? ...

• Traunrauschen

  Back in 2016, Energie AG Oberösterreich committed an outrageous ecological sin against the river Traun in Goisern, in the form of a hydroelectric power plant: a concrete thrombosis that is now clogging the lifeline of the Salzkammergut. Now, 2.5km downstream, another dam wall is to be erected ...

• Whitsun message

  Dear theologically-shrouded letter writers!
  (Since it was only men who felt compelled to explain the true nature of God and Jesus to me with plenty of Bible quotations, I'll forego German gendering this time.) ...

• Sourdough bread

  Hello, dear readers of the website. Together with the Austrian Alps, the plans for the tour are currently sinking beneath deep snow. In the face of recent developments, it came as no surprise when I received the news that the start of the tour, planned for mid-April, wouldn't work out ...

2020

• The secret of the last Christmas tree

  It began every year with the procurement of brushwood for the advent wreath. Its origin was never a secret; we cut it from a tree, from a fir in the forest that began right behind the house ...

• It is how it is ...

  Even if many believe it's not true and is in fact a conspiracy of dark powers ... Our power of judgement has not yet deserted us and so therefore we have decided, though with heavy hearts, to postpone all the concerts planned for autumn 2020 until spring 2021 ...

• To all those who applied ...

  It was a very enriching, joyful, but also challenging task for the jury to select 10 winners from the 171 applications. Doubling the number of awards to be handed out made it no easier ...

• Culture Award 2020

  Dear applicants for the HvG Culture Award 2020, due to the extraordinary situation we all, and in particular the cultural sector and artists, must deal with for a while yet ...

• Happy Easter

  Happy Easter, although this moment in time is not (yet) offering us what is meant by resurrection. Or is it?...

• Give yourselves a push ...

  There have been many questions as to the criteria for applying to the culture award I founded. It's actually very simple...

2019

• To all those who applied ...

  A total of 151 highly interesting, very inspired and touching applications were sent in for the HvG Culture Award 2019. Making the selection took an accordingly long time, as we read, listened to and watched everything thoroughly ...

• HvG Culture Award 2019

  The submission deadline for the Culture Award 2019 has now passed. My heartfelt thanks for the 151 inspired applications, which are overflowing with creativity ...

• Last call!

  The deadline for applications for the HvG Culture Award draws closer and closer. If you want to apply, you'll need to make haste. Come 1st April, it'll be too late ...

• Those were the days....

  In the eighties a battle for attention took place every evening in the Roter Engel. Wolfgang Staribacher, my co-Alpine Cat at the time, once hit the nail on the head: "Man, playing in the R.E. is like performing street music on a traffic island" ...

2018

• Over the hill - what next?

  It is but one small step from verbal hostility to violence. Anyone who engages with world history knows that. When it comes to the Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ), inhibition threshold is traditionally less pronounced ...

2017

• Conchita - can't you hear how time flies?

  Throughout the history of mankind there have been courageous women and men who have broken taboos, opened locked doors and shown us new paths ...

• Who's batty and nuts here?

  Open letter in response to an album review of Bilderbuch's Magic Life in the Austrian daily newspaper Der Standard.

• Post

  Dear friends, I've finally found the time to read through the many, many letters and emails of months past (a number of which were from years ago!) ...

2016

• Open letter to John Otti Band and Norbert Hofer

  In response to repeated use of his music at FPÖ campaign events, Hubert von Goisern voices his displeasure in an open letter to the John Otti Band and Presidential candidate Norbert Hofer's campaign team.

• October 2016

  There once was – though this doesn't mean there no longer is. I'm still on the road in spirit ...

• September 2016

  The summer is coming to an end. I enjoyed it at home – I as good as never left the Salzkammergut. Why would I? ...

• Election cramp pain

  Ah yes, a third federal presidency ballot is imminent too ...

• Sommerzeit

  Summertime has been ushered in. The first quarter of the year drew to a close yesterday. Shrovetide, Lent and Easter too are already in the past, just like our small, but excellent USA tour ...

2015

• 12/15

  December has begun, the final month of the year. The end of 2015 approaches. Darkness and cold have us searching for comfort and protection and see us moving closer together ...

• 6/15

  Things always take their own course. I'd like to always have them under control. But it doesn't work that way. I don't even always have myself under control - but that's good ...

• Earthquake in Nepal

  On 25th April the earth shook more violently than ever in the Himalayas and since then there have been more than one hundred aftershocks. It's a catastrophe of unimaginable magnitude ...

• 5/15

  Sarah has just reminded me for the umpteenth time that there hasn't been a new entry on the "desk" for more than six months. How true ...

2014

• Winter can come

  Our short but sweet autumn tour had its finale yesterday in Linz ...

2013

• Decency

  HvG writes on the subject of decency and civility.

2012

• Thank you

  Thank you for a year that couldn't have been envisioned in even the wildest of dreams ...

• Too early for a résumé

  Accommodating my webmistress's request, or should I say, bowing to her gentle pressure, I'll "for goodness sake" write something for the "desk" on my homepage ...

• Perpetual fools' freedom in the perpetual ice?

  (Or: who are "we" really?)

2011

• That's the way it is ...

  The year 2011 is drawing to a close. And this much is already clear: it was a fulfilling and successful year ...

• Meanwhile ...

  The first leg of the tour came to an end a few days ago. It was a wonderful time. We really enjoyed being on stage together again ...

• The Tavern Tour

  With these concerts we want to make a contribution to breathing life into mostly underused concert venues. And I'm curious to see how the audiences will react to our music ...

2009

• Auf wiedersehen 2011

  In order for something new to develop, something has to be able to come to an end too. The harbour festival in Linz was a worthy ending to our journeys down to the Black Sea, up to the North Sea and back again ...

• 10th March

  50 years ago exactly to the day, a peaceful Tibetan rebellion against the Chinese occupying power was bloodily struck down ...

2008

• Election 2008

  What a bloody mess! With the result of the Austrian national election, the biblical saying "Where three have come together, I am there among them" is given new meaning ...

• Tibet, March 2008

  While 2008 is the Year of the Rat for the Chinese, in Tibet one speaks of the Year of the Earth Mouse ...

2007

• Losar 2007

  There is nothing left to say about Tibet, everything has been said - over and over again...
  And yet it still needs to be said, over and over again ...

2006

• Open letter to H. C. Strache

  In an open letter to the FPÖ leader H. C. Strache, Hubert von Goisern requests no further use of his music at election events.

2005

• Waiting for Timbuktu

  Mali had already been on the bill in 2002, together with Senegal, Burkina Faso, the Cape Verde islands and the Ivory Coast. But you don't always get what you want, certainly not in Africa ...

2004

• At night everything seems bigger, more mystical in the mountains

  I grew up in Goisern, in the Salzkammergut. So I was surrounded by the rubble of the Dachstein massif from when I was small ...

1998

• My life, a path

  My life is and always has been movement, change. I have always travelled the world, become acquainted with many individuals, peoples and landscapes ...

1996

• Journey to Tibet

  In spring Hubert von Goisern and Tseten Zöchbauer travelled to Tibet. Here HvG shares his experiences in his Tibet travel diary.

1994

• Paris - Texas - New York

  Hubert von Goisern and the Alpinkatzen play in Paris, San Antonio and New York. The travel diary of an international commuter.