Archived under: Teaching
Converting to Horn, Part II
To extend the topic of the previous post slightly, almost every horn player has to switch something pretty major at some point in their schooling.
Lets say for example you are a flute player. From the rank beginner to the pro level you will be playing on increasingly expensive versions of essentially the same instrument with the same fingerings.
If you start on horn your story will be different. Lets say you survive junior high on your single F horn. Then you get to high school and you are handed a double horn and a mellophone or a B-flat marching horn! Half the fingerings are new/different and the new instruments feel really different in the hands.
Teachers always hope that students will find it exciting to change to the new instruments and bloom as players but reality is some are not up to the challenge; they will go under the radar for a while, won’t really convert to the new instruments, and will quit sooner or later.
It is a part of the horn puzzle players and teachers have to negotiate in building horn sections.
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