Carl Eisner, a horn virtuoso of the 19th century, received his education in Dresden. Although he was court musician in St.Petersburg until 1836 he found time to travel through Europe as a horn virtuoso. Performances with his own compositions are proved to be presented also in Dresden, Vienna, Prague and Leipzig.
His warm tone and his brilliant technology was praised in the AMZ (General Musical Newspaper) and there was noted that he still played with the natural horn. Eisner however mastered also the new valve horn as mentioned from other concert reviews and transferred the tonal advantages of the natural horn to the technically better valve horn.
Eisner moved to the court chapel in Dresden 1836 and got the title as a chamber musician in 1853. He became teacher for horn in the first conservatory of music which was founded in 1856 by him among others.
2nd Sextet for Flute, Oboe, Clarinet, Horn, Bassetthorn and Bassoon
Carl Eisner dedicated the first sectet to the Dresdner Tonkünstlerverein. certainly, he was one of the members and played the horn part in this sextet. It can be assumed that the second sextet was also written for this ensemble but there is no dedication mentioned. Boch sextets are composed about 1854 to 1870. The composer expressly allocated the horn part for valve horn / chromatic horn.
Concerning the compostional qualities of these until now unpublished sextets, they are comparable with the quintets of Reicha. Virtuous parts, excellent handling of each instrument and the exact and extensive dynamical remarks prove the real quality of the composer Carl Eisner.
