Hans Koessler was born on 1 January 1853 in Waldeck (today part of Kemnath in the Upper Palatinate). From 1874 to 1877 he studied organ under Joseph Rheinberger and attended Franz Wüllner's choral class in Munich. He then worked as a teacher of theory and choral singing at the Dresden Conservatory and as conductor of the Dresden Liedertafel.
From 1882 to 1908 he taught organ and choral singing at the Royal Academy of Music in Budapest, later becoming professor of composition and being raised to personal nobility. His students included some of the most significant Hungarian composers of the era: Zoltán Kodály, Béla Bartók, Emmerich Kálmán, Ernst von Dohnányi, and Leó Weiner.
After his retirement in 1908 he returned to Germany, but at the urging of Kálmán and Dohnányi was engaged once again in Budapest, to secure him a modest income. Koessler died on 23 May 1926 in Ansbach.
An obituary in the Hungarian literary journal Nyugat ("West") names 48 students by name from his 43 years as a composition teacher in Budapest, including the later academy teacher Albert Siklós, the composer Árpád Szendy, and the operetta composers Jenő Huszka and Viktor Jacobi.
Koessler composed over one hundred and thirty works, including an opera, two symphonies, symphonic variations for orchestra, a violin concerto, a mass for female choir and organ, psalm settings, and chamber music.
The 4 Songs for voice (soprano or tenor), oboe, horn, and string quartet presented here as a first edition are sourced from a set of manuscript parts (possibly an autograph) held at the Berlin State Library – Prussian Cultural Heritage, Music Department with Mendelssohn Archive. The four titles are "Traurig Scheiden" (Wilhelm Osterwald), "Auf dem Wasser" (Emanuel Geibel), "Herbst" (Nikolaus Lenau), and "Liebesklage der Elaine" (Alfred Tennyson).
