MusicWeb International by Jonathan Woolf The notes to this première recording disarmingly begin by asking ‘Joseph who?’ and it’s true that if one knows Lauber’s name at all it’s largely in relation to his works for flute and harp, not for large-scale symphonies, though he wrote six of them, all of which are to be recorded in this series.

A brief biography of the Swiss composer, who was an exact contemporary of Richard Strauss, would also include his birth near Lucerne, music studies at the Zurich Conservatory under his composition teacher Friedrich Hegar, a friend of Brahms, and some further studies with Joseph Rheinberger in Munich. Then there was Paris where he honed his pianistic skills with Louis Diémer and compositional ones with Massenet. Later, on his return to Switzerland, he became professor at the Conservatoire in Geneva.