Christian Gottlieb Tubel, – Sonata a tre for 3 Horns
This Sonata for Three Horns is kept in the State Library of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Schwerin. The title reads:
Sonata | à Tré | Corno Primo | Corno Secondo | Corno Terzo. | Composta | di | Tubel, | Agente, della Sua Altezza Serenissima | il Duca regnante di Brunswigo é | Luneburgo.
Christian Gottlieb Tubel (often spelled Tübel) was probably of Dutch origin. Music dictionaries record very little about him, and even his birth date is unclear; he is thought to have died in Hamburg in 1776. On the title page of the Sonata, as well as in a keyboard tutor from 1766, he is named as the agent of the Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg. From around 1760 to 1770 he apparently worked as the manager of a marble mill in Blankenburg am Harz.
Only a handful of Tubel's compositions survive, including several harpsichord sonatas, two symphonies, and a cantata. On 4 August 1757, in The Hague, Tübel — then in the service of Brunswick-Lüneburg — gave a concert on the harp and the pantaleon (a type of hammered dulcimer). In Amsterdam, on Tuesday, 2 May 1770, a performance took place under Tubel's direction, in which some 30 musicians performed his cantata "Ino". On 28 December 1771, a concert took place in Arnhem at which Tubel played the harp.
In his Sonata a tre for three horns, the first horn is written very high, while the third horn virtuosically reaches into the low register, using tones that lie outside the ordinary natural harmonic series. The Sonata does not indicate which crook (key) the horns should be played in; horns in D are recommended.
