John Ericson
From the Mailbag: Bore Sizes and French Horns
Another recent question that came in had to do with bore of horns, as in what is actually meant when people say a horn...
From the Mailbag: Hollow Valves
I was recently asked a question about what exactly is meant when a horn has “hollow valves.”
To understand the term in a general way...
Hornmasters: Merewether on Right Hand Position
Richard Merewether, as a horn designer, has an interesting perspective on hand position in The horn, the horn….
In the day-to-day activity of assisting players...
Long Before Farkas: Horn Mutes and Other Advice for Brass Players from 1813
Way back in 1813 a comprehensive method book with sections on all the instruments was published, the Vollständige Theoretisch-pracktische Musikschule of Joseph Fröhlich....
Auf dem Strom and the Natural Horn
People by nature try to categorize things and find notable “firsts.” One “first” often given to Schubert, incorrectly, is that Auf dem Strom (1828)...
Hornmasters: Berv on Right Hand Position
As was seen in his discussion of left hand position, for Harry Berv in A Creative Approach to the French Horn one central point...
An Advocate for the Alto Horn in 1968
In 1990 a wonderful brass resource was published, Brass Bibliography: Sources on the History, Literature, Pedagogy, Performance, and Acoustics of Brass Instruments by Mark...
Hornmasters: Yancich and Robinson on Right Hand Position
Milan Yancich in A Practical Guide to French Horn Playing offers a practical approach to finding a good hand position.
There are many hand positions...
Nickel silver and horns — construction, look, and sound
One question that comes up periodically is that of what nickel silver is and why some horns are made of nickel silver and some...
The Prelude to Act III of Lohengrin and Crazy Horn Notations in Wagner
One excerpt horn players learn is the Prelude to Act III of Lohengrin. I was recently working on this with a young student as...