Photo: © Elli Christl

Classical guitar lessons followed and Hubert bought himself an electric guitar with his own money. Practising was difficult however, as his loud playing upset the guests in the spa town, who were looking for a little more peace and quiet than Hubert's guitar allowed. His grandfather introduced him to the accordion when Hubert returned from his travels later in life. At first wanting nothing to do with the instrument, he picked it up one night and began to play, determined to get something new from the traditional instrument. Hubert has taught himself most of the instruments you see him play, with the exception of a few lessons on the guitar, trumpet and clarinet. His travels throughout the world have also been an opportunity to come into contact with more diverse instruments.

As Hubert von Goisern entered his twenties, he decided that he had finally had enough of answering to authority in Austria; his homeland simply became too confining for him. He emigrated to South Africa with his girlfriend and worked there as a chemistry laboratory technician. After three and a half years, the racial segregation became too much for Hubert although he had tried himself to fight it by organising sports events where blacks and whites could meet. He returned home, but once back in Austria, he met a Canadian girl who had eyes only for him. They married and he moved to Toronto with her. He also took her surname, Sullivan, for the sake of simplicity.

It was at the age of 30 that Hubert made a conscious decision that he wanted to be a musician. If he could not manage to make a living from it by the time he was 40, then he would give up and try something else. His wife was not especially happy about this and his parents finally had to abandon their hopes for their son becoming a doctor. Hubert studied music in Toronto for two years, including lessons in flamenco guitar. After his marriage ended, he set off travelling again, this time ending up in the Philippines. Here he lived for a few months with head hunters and took the opportunity to learn to play a variety of bamboo instruments, including the nose-flute. He taught the Filipinos Austrian folk songs while they sang him theirs and it was here that he realised that perhaps he could find a way to his own native musical traditions.

In 1984, Hubert returned to Austria and studied electroacoustics as well as experimental music at the Musikhochschule in Vienna. He also worked as a freelance musician and composer and two years later he met fellow musician Wolfgang Staribacher in the Rote Engel music club. They performed together and a year later, the instrumental Solide Alm was written. Together they formed the Alpinkatzen. It was also at this time that Hubert took his stage name, Hubert von Goisern, because as he made their introduction on stage, his partner was Wolfgang from Vienna and he was Hubert from Goisern. After playing in various bars and clubs, a manager of a record company finally discovered the duo and offered them a contract.

Although success did not seem to be forthcoming, and although Wolfgang and Hubert occasionally played before audiences of no more than five people, they made their first album: Alpine Lawine. Unfortunately it was not a great success. Work began on a second album and the pair also took part in the Watzmann tour, during which they performed a song from the forthcoming album: Koa Hiatamadl.

After disagreements Hubert von Goisern and Wolfgang Staribacher went their separate ways. Hubert wanted to continue with the Alpinkatzen project and was now looking for a new band. His sound engineer Wolfgang Spannberger was responsible for introducing him to both keyboard player Stefan Engel and drummer Wolfgang Maier. Guitarist Reinhard Stranzinger introduced himself after his own music project began to face problems. All they needed now was a female singer.

Knowing he was looking for a singer, Hubert's neighbour gave him a tape of her niece performing with the Walchsee Seerosen Trio. The niece was Sabine Kapfinger and thus the Alpinkatzen band was complete. She joined Hubert von Goisern, as a studio singer at first, then on stage at the age of 18. Sabine brought with her an important element of traditional Austrian folk music: yodelling. Hubert learned this art from Sabine, listening to her on his Walkman and practising on a motorway bridge where nobody could hear him.

The second album, Aufgeigen stått niederschiassen, was released in 1992. This album contained some of Hubert's most well-known songs: Heast as Nit, Weit, Weit Weg and Koa Hiatamadl. The radio stations picked up on this last song and played it continuously - and suddenly Hubert von Goisern and the Alpinkatzen were in the charts.

Demand increased to see Hubert and the band live on stage. Rather than an audience of fifty, they were now playing to five thousand people at a time. Hubert had managed it with perfect timing: he received a gold disc for Aufgeigen stått niederschiassen on the day before his 40th birthday. He invited the press and the record company officials to the top of Dachstein - a 3004m high mountain in Austria - for the presentation.

In February 1994, the next album followed – Omunduntn, which was awarded platinum barely a month later. The album was also accompanied by Das Video. This documented the band's travels to France for Les Eurofolies Festival and to America to play in Austin. Although few in the audience may have been able to follow many of the lyrics, the music went down a storm. From standing ovations and encores in Texas the band moved on to play a club in New York before flying back home.

There was no time for rest though. Hubert and the band continued the Omunduntn tour around Germany, Austria and Switzerland. However, the news soon broke that this would be the last tour. On the 1st November 1994, Hubert von Goisern and the Alpinkatzen would play their last concert. One of the last appearances at Circus Krone in Munich was recorded for posterity as the film Wia die Zeit Vergeht (How The Time Flies). This was presented at the Munich Film Festival on the 1st July 1995. The same year, the live CD from the Omunduntn tour was released, also entitled Wia die Zeit vergeht.

Although an era had ended for Hubert von Goisern, he was by no means at a loose end, designing two fashion collections with tailor and friend, Klaus Höller, manufactured by the fashion house Meindl. He even made his acting debut in the TV film Hölleisengretl in 1994 playing Matthias, the cruel husband of hunchbacked Gretl (Martina Gedeck).

While director Joseph Vilsmaier originally wanted Hubert von Goisern to play the main part of Elias in his next film, Schlafes Bruder (Brother of Sleep), the restraints of the final tour meant that Hubert could not accept the part. He instead wrote the soundtrack with Norbert J. Schneider, also spending two nights at the organ in Salzburg's cathedral with Harald Fellner. A number of other film soundtracks were completed, including a collaboration with the young musicians from the Leoganger KinderKultur programme in 1996, producing the music for the children’s film Ein Rucksack voller Lügen (A Rucksack Full of Lies).

Tseten Zöchbauer, head of the organisation Save Tibet asked Hubert von Goisern in March 1996 to support a tour of Tibetan artists from The Tibetan Institute of Performing Arts (TIPA), around Austria. Hubert accepted the offer on the condition that he could also present the tour. His interest in Tibet and its people heightened and he asked Tseten, who had not been to her homeland since she was two years old, to accompany him on a journey to Tibet.

The pair spent about six weeks in Tibet and Hubert unfortunately came to see that all the tales of oppression in Tibet were true: there was no freedom. The journey had left lasting impressions and there were many stories to share. However music has always been Hubert’s most natural form of expression and the idea was already growing, to breathe new life into Tibetan folk songs.

Hubert set off on another journey - this time to Dharamsala. In an audience with His Holiness the Dalai Lama he asked for permission to work with the old Tibetan songs and was pleased to be told that he and the exiled Tibetan musicians should do whatever they want with the music. After some initial recordings were made in India in his mobile recording studio, Hubert invited four of the artists - Pasang Lhamo, Sherab Wangmo, Jamjang Chönden and Sonam Püntsok - back to Salzburg. The resulting recordings became the CD Inexil.

It was during the production of Wia die Zeit vergeht that Hubert met Jane Goodall, the British chimpanzee research scientist. Their mutual friend, publisher Michael Neugebauer introduced them one snowy evening in Bad Goisern. Hubert was entranced by Jane's stories of Africa and the pair talked for hours. She invited him to the National Park Gombe in Tanzania and in early 1996, Hubert made his first journey to East Africa. There he developed the idea of making a documentary about Jane's work. Von Goisern nach Gombe was the result and the soundtrack to the film was released as the Gombe album in 1998.

Then in summer 1999, Hubert von Goisern once more felt the desire to compose. He started in October of the same year and composed into the winter. Together with his new band he went into the studio in the summer of 2000. Finally, after waiting for six years, on 6th November 2000 the fans were able to get their hands on Fön - Hubert's highly successful comeback album.

Just four months later in March 2001 Hubert von Goisern released another new album. With Trad he fulfilled a long-held wish to record and release a collection of traditional Austrian folk songs. Together with the material from Fön, these songs formed the programme for the highly successful concert tour that began in the spring.

In May 2001, Hubert was awarded the Amadeus Austrian Music Award for Best National Artist Rock/Pop. In his acceptance speech, he criticised the Austrian music industry and radio stations for not supporting Austrian artists. Many newspapers reported what he had said the next day and there was more coverage when it turned out that ORF had edited his speech in their broadcast.

With some new band members in tow, Hubert travelled to Egypt in March 2002, where he played to an audience of 15,000 in Assiut. He shared the stage with Egypt's most popular pop star, Mohamed Mounir and played a duet with him - the start of a close friendship. After the stop in Egypt, Hubert and the band spent three weeks touring West Africa, where they met and played concerts with local musicians.

Back home again Hubert von Goisern and his band spent the summer on tour and also made an appearance at KöniXXtreffen - Virgin Germany’s 20th anniversary celebrations in Munich. Hubert also released his first single in eight years, Poika, as prelude to the new album Iwasig, which was released to great acclaim in September 2002.

After a winter club tour, Hubert once more gathered his musicians around him to begin work on Trad II. They shunned the usual studio in the city, instead taking all their equipment to an abandoned mountain hotel at 2100m above sea level on the Krippenstein mountain, where they recorded a second collection of folk songs.

February 2003 saw Hubert von Goisern's third nomination for an Amadeus Award, having meanwhile won in 2002 with Trad: Best National Male Artist for Iwasig. However, Hubert did not attend the event, in protest at the continued neglect of Austrian artists by their own country's media.

After concerts in Sarajevo and Cape Verde, where Hubert von Goisern and his band played at the Gamboa Festival to an audience of around 90,000 people, the tour in summer 2003 also had something else very special for music lovers: Mohamed Mounir and his band joined Hubert and his musicians for three weeks on the road. The joint concerts included separate showcases for both artists as well as two spectacular joint sets, each night ending with Madad, Mohamed Mounir's song for peace. This impressive example of cultural exchange was met with open minds and open hearts by both fans and journalists, with many glowing reviews appearing in newspapers across the German-speaking area.

In October, Hubert invited colleagues and journalists up to Krippenstein in order to present the finished Trad II CD. After the Süddeutsche Zeitung named Hubert "Best Artist", 2003 came to an end with the broadcast of Hubert von Goisern Trad II, a film of eight songs from Trad II, woven together with Hubert travelling around his homeland of the Salzkammergut.

The first quarter of 2004 bode well for the rest of the year: Hubert's hometown of Bad Goisern honoured him with an Ehrenbürgerschaft, making him a freeman of Bad Goisern. The next honour to be bestowed was a stamp: Hubert von Goisern graced a special edition 55 cent stamp. An initial run of 10,000 sold out in five days and a second run, with a slightly different design followed. The Trad II tour was also a great success, playing to full concert halls, and continued to the winter.

In January 2005, Hubert von Goisern took his band to Mali to play at the Festival au Désert. They also performed with local balaphon virtuoso Kele Tigi in the Akwaba club in Bamako. A camera team accompanied the musicians on their trip, resulting in the 45 minute film, Warten auf Timbuktu (Waiting for Timbuktu), which was published together with a live album from the Trad II tour in the doublepack release Ausland in October 2005.

Although he announced that he would not tour for a couple of years, Hubert von Goisern kept himself busy with music. In May, he presented his sound installation in the Dachstein ice caves and in the summer of 2005 he composed the new club anthem for the Red Bull Salzburg football team.

After his popular song Heast as nit was played at an Austrian Freedom Party political rally in the Tyrol in April 2006, Hubert von Goisern published an open letter to HC Strache, leader of the party, requesting that his songs not be used at further FPÖ events. "I stand for an open, tolerant society, for the destruction of fear of the unknown and new, and not for the fomentation thereof," he wrote, "I stand for looking changes in the eye and looking forward, not for the attempt to stop time, or to even turn it back; that is the content of Heast as nit..."

In July 2007 the double CD Derweil was released, a collection of 34 of the best songs from Hubert's career so far, chosen by Hubert himself. All his musical developments were represented and as a special treat, several new mixes and one previously unreleased song with Mohamed Mounir were to be found on the album.

In the autumn of 2006, Hubert von Goisern presented his grandest project yet: the Linz Europe Tour 2007-2009. From summer 2007 he would be travelling along the waterways of Europe for three years on a specially adapted cargo ship, complete with a stage. In 2007 Hubert and his band explored the east and on his journey to the Black Sea delta took on board musicians, who played with him, rehearsed and gave concerts in more than 20 ports.

Before setting off on tour again in summer 2008, Hubert von Goisern released his long-awaited new studio CD: S'Nix. The album reached number 2 in the Austrian music charts and was the subject of numerous enthusiastic reviews. The new songs also formed part of the stage programme for the second leg of the Linz Europe Tour, as Hubert and his band sailed northwest from Linz to the North Sea and back again, once more performing concerts with local musicians along the way.

The grand finale of the Linz Europe Tour took the form of a three day festival in the European Capital of Culture Linz in July 2009. Artists from both west and east tours joined Hubert von Goisern and his band once more to explore the wonderful musical variety that Europe holds.

During the time on board his concert ship Hubert von Goisern kept a diary, recording the adventures, challenges and delights of the tour. These stories became Stromlinien: Ein Logbuch (Streamlines: A Logbook), Hubert's authorial debut, published in May 2010.

Sarah Marchant
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