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Many Horn Matters readers will be familiar with the Works with Horn by Female Composers website by Dr. Lin Foulk. If not, this is a must visit resource of the horn world, be sure to check it out.
However, there is a category of works for horn that is not covered there, horn etudes [but see UPDATE at end!]. Surprisingly, I am only aware of three horn etude publications by women composers. I’d like to reintroduce two of them to Horn Matters readers, and briefly review a brand new publication for 2021.
The oldest publication I’m aware of are the Interval Studies by Pauline Oliveros (1932-2016). They were composed in 1959, and I examined them briefly in this previous article. Oliveros is best known for concepts related to deep listening and electronic music, the etudes being written when she was a horn student. Looking at these more this past year with one of my students, I think there are some very interesting musical ideas in this book, interesting enough to consider performing them as solo horn works. In fact, that student, Adam Heyen, performed three of these studies on his final ASU MM recital. To hear them, check out this video (starting just after the 46 minute mark). These are highly worth visiting with an advanced student or for your own musical exploration.
Backing up a step, having recently composed some etudes of my own, it really brings home to me how much horn etudes provide insights into the musical world of the author. It is a shame that we are so reliant on tired old pedagogical materials, and that we have so few etudes by female hornists/composers. I hope more will take up the challenge in the coming years, as we badly need some fresh etude materials, and after this year of Covid especially we all really deserve some fresh, new music to play.
The second etude publication I would highlight is Rangesongs by Rose French. Rose was my first DMA graduate from ASU, and currently serves as Director of Instrumental Music at Phoenix College. I interviewed her about the then new publication back in 2012. I’ve only this year really started into using this publication with a student, and I should have done it sooner. The book has several underlying pedagogical goals, the most obvious being building range as the range gets wider and wider as you go forward in the book, but also everything is songlike and tuneful. Each etude is one page in length, and there are 93 etudes total. This book will be excellent for an advancing student or an amateur coming back to the horn. Typically, I use etude books front to back, but in this case I’m finding it very helpful to have started with my student at two places in the book to provide more harmonic variety.
The final publication I want to highlight is brand new for 2021, 18 Virtuosic Concert Studies for Low Horn by Kate Caliendo, who presently serves as second horn in the Jacksonville Symphony. Some readers likely have never heard of her, but actually she is very well known among a younger generation of horn players due to Instagram, where she as of this writing has over 8,000 followers! Her new collection of concert studies interests me a great deal. I would rate them in overall difficulty to be somewhere between the Pre and Neuling low horn etudes that I’ve been using with students for a number of years (I am very convinced that low range development as a key to success), and in a much fresher melodic style. Each etude is either one or two pages long and is built on moods and themes related to other works, with a lot of variety. I very much look forward to using this book, and have already selected the beginning of number 7, “These Notes DO Exist,” as part of our music for ensemble seating auditions at ASU this fall.
As I mentioned in my earlier brief review of the Oliveros etudes, I don’t much like critiquing the actual publication quality of print publications (and the price point). While Rangesongs has a very professionally printed look and feel (with a thick glossy cover and high quality paper), the Oliveros and Kaliendo books have more of a locally printed look. It does not impact your ability to use the materials, of course. Certainly the profits per copy on all of these are lower than you might guess.
Please, PLEASE, horn teachers out there, use some new books. Buy them NOW, learn them over the summer, and use them in the fall. It really is time to step up and make some changes. I’ve made my own publications really easy to buy on Amazon and as cheap as they can be, with my Modern Preparatory Etudes being applicable to many study situations, but sales remain slow. Please take some time when the dust clears from the semester and explore some new materials to teach from, your students will thank you.
UPDATE: Dr. Foulk has added a section on etudes! Check it out here.
