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.)
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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
Hornmasters on Rapid Tonguing, Part II: Brophy
Rapid single tonguing is one of the topics covered in depth by William R. Brophy in his Technical Studies for Solving Special Problems on...
Reinhardt Compared to Farkas
One of the things I have found very interesting in this series is trying to set the context for why Philip Farkas wrote what...
Dreams and Goals; Music Performance and Music Education
Note: this article is a follow-up to "The Community College Alternative" which stimulated quite a few comments. My own follow-up comment became a bit...
Memes: Special Verne Reynolds Edition
Regular readers of Horn Matters know that Bruce Hembd and I both count Verne Reynolds among our former teachers. In an prior article I...
Hornmasters: The Exhale and Points of Resistance, Part II
As I have noted elsewhere, horn teachers of days gone by seem to rarely have attacked each other directly. But if you read their...
Accuracy Tip: Watch Your Fingers
Over the years one thing I have noticed in watching students is that a percentage of missed notes have to do with how your...
