Horn Matters is the leading online resource on the French horn, co-founded by John Ericson and Bruce Hembd. The mission of Horn Matters is: to encourage, inspire, inform, and challenge horn players, and; to promote the best musical instrument ever, the French horn. (More.)
- - Please visit: International Horn Competition of America - -Most Recent Articles
Mailbag: The Top 3 Horn Concertos
A question came in earlier this year asking generally what are the top 3 horn concertos. With the end of the semester for my...
Ultrasonic Cleaning and your Horn
You know that you need to keep your horn clean. If you are proactive about maintenance you will hardly ever need to have your...
Geyer Update: Engravings, Serial Numbers, and More
I could also have titled this article “Things I got wrong” in the Geyer Dreaming series (which starts here), or the related article published...
Revisiting the Art of French Horn on LP Records
The past year the vast majority of my actual classical music listening has been to LP records. With the recent passing of Hermann Baumann...
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Horn Etudes by Female Composers
Many Horn Matters readers will be familiar with the Works with Horn by Female Composers website by Dr. Lin Foulk. If not, this is...
Julius Watkins, jazz French horn pioneer
Talking with colleagues recently, a topic that came up was how some great players of the recent past are unjustly neglected today. In terms...
Overview of Trusted Brands in French Horns
A survey titled "What Brand Names Do You Trust?" collected the opinions of 392 participants. The results are in and while it may take...
Choosing a French Horn Mouthpiece (I): The Basic Parts
Part I: The Rim and Preliminary Thoughts
Part II: Cup, Throat and Bore
Part III: Weight, Plating and Shopping Tips
For the past decade...
French Horn Transposition Chart
A complete reference.
Transposition Chart (PDF) (updated 2012)
Over the past few months, I have been posting various transposition tricks, including how to transpose:
A and...
Farkas on Stagefright (and more)
In the world of horn there have been few that made as much impact as Philip Farkas (1914-1992). The Art of French Horn Playing...
Random Articles
Horn Repertoire Week 12: The Wagner Tuba
Continuing our look at some of the standard works horn players perform often from the nineteenth century our next topic is the Wagner tuba....
Anatomy of a Gadget Collection: An Overview of 21 Geeky Items...
Thinking outside the box is an expression that I take to heart when striving for improvement on the French horn.
While this pursuit does have...
What is a Professional Quality Horn?
A conversation I end up having fairly often is on the topic of what makes a horn a professional quality horn. Many horns are...
Monster Mash Wednesday
The truth that Hollywood tried to hide!
Today's monster horn player had to overcome both physical and mental setbacks, most notably a lower jaw overbite...
Bad Conventional Wisdom, part 2: Tonguing misconceptions
Returning to the story of 2008 and my teaching and playing, I faced a reality that I did not do what I thought I...
Humor: The Mind of the Horn Player
If you liked this article, you might also like "Top 10 Ways to Provoke a Horn-Geek."
