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Before Farkas: The Dufrasne (Mercier) Routine, Part II

PUBLISHED: February 12, 2011, John Ericson

As I noted in Part I, a new publication of the Dufrasne Routine was recently put out in The Complete Hornist series. In the acknowledgements editor Thomas Bacon notes that his source was “an old photocopy of a handwritten copy done by Bill Mercier, another student of Dufrasne,” also stating that this was a “complete practice routine” [...]

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Before Farkas

Before Farkas: The Mercier (Dufrasne) Routine, Part I

PUBLISHED: February 10, 2011, John Ericson

Ever wonder how the teacher of Farkas warmed up? Tonal Flexibility Studies for French Horn by William Mercier gives some clear insights. Cleaning the office over break I came across this classic 1948 publication. First I was thinking to do just a brief article as it has such an interesting cover. A bit hard to [...]

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Before Farkas

Long Before Farkas: Horn Mutes and Other Advice for Brass Players from 1813

PUBLISHED: June 3, 2010, John Ericson

Way back in 1813 a comprehensive method book with sections on all the instruments was published, the Vollständige Theoretisch-pracktische Musikschule [Complete Theoretical-practical Music Method] of Joseph Fröhlich. The various instrument methods published inside this work are reasonably well known to scholars (they were also published separately from the full Musikschule), but as described in the [...]

Before Farkas: Preparatory Instructor for French Horn (1937) on the Single B-Flat

PUBLISHED: December 17, 2009, John Ericson

I am not sure what the exact background was of authors E. C. Moore and A. O. Sieg but they certainly were practical band directors from the reasons they cite for having horn players use the single B-flat. The authors recommend strongly the Single Bb Horn as the horn best adapted to the usage of [...]

Before Farkas: Preparatory Instructor for French Horn (1937) on Tonguing

PUBLISHED: December 6, 2009, John Ericson
Preparatory Instructor for French Horn by Moore and Sieg

In working on a project this past year related to Philip Farkas I have had a nagging feeling that there has to be some back story, some reason why he said some of the things he said in The Art of French Horn Playing the way he did. Reading any book you know the author [...]

Before Farkas: Anton Horner on Tonguing

PUBLISHED: August 18, 2009, John Ericson

Kendall Betts in a recent post to the “Ask the Pros” section of the IHS website pointed out a great quotation on tonguing from Anton Horner from 1939. First, the quote: Attack each note with your tongue as though you had a small hair or tiny piece of thread on the end of your tongue [...]

Before Farkas: Birchard Coar

PUBLISHED: July 22, 2009, John Ericson

I recently updated my list of horn pedagogy resources in my studio site. It is not a comprehensive list but reflects what I think are among the best resources out there. Several are, unfortunately, out of print. Looking at the list, there is only one book from before 1956, The French Horn by Dr. Birchard [...]

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Before Farkas, Publications
John Ericson & Bruce Hembd
on the French horn, brass related topics, and the field of classical music.