Muted or Stopped in American in Paris?
I enjoyed hearing the ASU Symphony concert last night. One of the works on the program was American in Paris by George Gershwin. In this work there are a number of stopped passages. These were performed well by the ASU horn players, bravo! Great intonation, and they projected out well.
I have performed this work many times. I don’t think I have ever performed it with the stopped passages as stopped horn. I am pretty sure in every group we kind of looked at each other and said, hey; let’s play this muted instead of stopped. This must happen very commonly in this and other works, especially if they border on being pops concert material and when stopped does not really work out well. It does simplify intonation and projection issues.
This may sound harsh but I would suggest never asking the conductor what you should do on a passage where there is a question as to muted or stopped. You may not like their answer and they probably have never considered the question. Instead, do what you think works best, and if the conductor asks you to change, do what they say.
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