Some thoughts on warming up

During my 30 or so years of teaching the horn, my teaching methods have gone through some evolutions. The tendency has been consciously and unconsciously to simplify things, both for me and for my students.

The physical part of playing the horn is not rocket science, but in my opinion it is actually quite a simple procedure if one has basic musicality and a certain talent for body coordination. It is about producing wind with varied speed against the sail, which is the lips. The more complex part is the “song,” as in Arnold Jacobs’ “Song and Wind”. The brain, or your soul if you prefer, gives you the song. The song should pass through your body into the horn freely, just as good singers would approach a beautiful melody in their best range.

This, in a nutshell, is why we practice.

It is important to get a good start physically to your horn-playing day in order to find this free, natural song. Breathing exercises before touching the horn are very valuable. Try to relax your breathing, so that inhaling or exhaling larger amounts of air and doing it slowly  or quickly feels natural, like a reflex, and involves tensing muscles as little as possible. Look for inspiration from yoga.

You should then make sure that the lips are in a good position against each other for free and effortless vibration. Lips that are too open or too tight will lead to many problems. Use mouthpiece buzzing and mental images to find the right position; avoid any squeezing or thinking about the muscles. Play just with the mouthpiece around the middle range, looking for an effortless transition to and from the low range. Listen to the sound. Is it free and centered? I personally use a little buzzing only with the lips in my warm up, combined with mouthpiece playing. This should be done with caution on just a few middle-range notes. In daily practice, a bit of controlled buzzing only with lips can be used for embouchure strength building.

Relaxed air flow and easy buzz are the cornerstones of my warmup routine and horn playing philosophy. My other important warm up exercises are for flexibility, low range and attacks. I have, as many others nowadays, discovered the benefits of flutter tongue, which are in my opinion:

• Massage for the tongue. It can relax and open up the back of the tongue and throat, leading to less air resistance and thus better sound and easier tone production.
• You have to produce a certain air pressure against the tongue for it to start to flutter - this will help you get your air moving.
• The front of the tongue can be brought into a perfect position for clear attacks with flutter tongue exercises.

Lecture for the 9th International Horn Workshop
Hartford, 1977

by lb Lanky - Otto

The title of this little talk can perhaps be taken as a provocation; isn't a beautiful horn tone exactly what we are all striving for? Yet I ask this question because I am convinced that the tone we produce is the most unimportant aspect of getting the best result, and it must not be the focus of our problems and concentration.

How often don't we say: "Oh, what an ugly Sound he or she has"? Do we really mean what we say? Couldn't there be something else displeasing us? Try to analyze: perhaps he or she has a hard or clumsy attack? Does he end a phrase heavily? Or does he push every note like a "wah-wah?" Or there could be something else I haven't mentioned here. Anyway, if it is any of these characteristics or any other kind of playing behavior, it has nothing to do with the tone; it is the treatment of the tone.

If the tone ideal as such is an important.question, my highest ideal as a horn player wouldn't be Dennis Brain. To my taste he didn't have an especially charming sound, certainly not the so-called "romantic" horn sound. A Iess gifted horn player wouldn't have had such tremendous success with that particular sound. Now then, what is the difference between a master and the less brilliant star? Of course, in the case of Brain, the musicality: the "agogik"⁽¹⁾ and phrasing. That's an important part of the treatment of the tone. But even more important elements of what we are talking about here are:

It’s trivia time again! Think you know your jazz? Answer the 3 main questions correctly, and you will be entered into a drawing for this month’s prize, Arkady Shilkloper’s latest CD, LUSTRUM, with Vadim Neselovskyi. Three copies are up for grabs. The bonus questions are tiebreakers…Send your answers to hornandmore@hornsociety.org by June 30. Many thanks to jazz expert Steve Schaughency for these challenging questions - be sure to check out his lecture/demonstration at IHS51!

Question #1: Jazz horn pioneer Julius Watkins, and the King of Pop, Micheal Jackson, spent several years (at different times) working for/collaborating musically with which music industry giant?

A. Quincy Jones
B. Phil Spector
C. Brian Eno
D. George Martin

Bonus question #1: What nickname did Watkins earn during his time working with the answer to Question #1?

A. Tootie
B. The Phantom
C. Julius Caesar
D. The Professor

Question #2: Due in part to the incorporation of the Mellophonium (a forward facing F alto horn with a cornet shank) into a couple of jazz big bands during the late 1950‘s, hornists now have quite a large repertoire with 4 „horn“ parts plus big band. Name the famous big band leader responsible for the development of this instrument and with which instrument manufacturer did he collaborate?

A. Woody Herman and DEG
B. Stan Kenton and C.G. Conn
C. Duke Ellington and King Musical Instruments
D. Buddy Rich and Blessing

By Emily Britton

In the nineteenth century, with increased wealth from industrialization, the American public began to establish orchestras.  Many of the musicians in these orchestras were immigrants, mostly from Germany and Bohemia.  To this day, many of the instrumental traditions or schools in the United States are in the German tradition; the horn is no exception.  Today, most American horn players play on German-style horns and focus primarily on Austro-German repertoire.  Concertos by W. A. Mozart, Richard Strauss and his father, Franz, and Franz Joseph Haydn are standard works, along with sonatas by Paul Hindemith and Joseph Rheinberger and the Johannes Brahms’ Horn Trio.  The average undergraduate horn player will play three standard French works:  the Dukas Villanelle, Bozza’s En Forêt, and the Saint-Saëns Morceau de Concert.  A few will play the Poulenc Élégie or the Françaix Divertimento.  Sadly, this leaves a wealth of French repertoire neglected by most American collegiate horn players. While it is important to learn standard repertoire, there are many hidden gems in the existing French repertoire.

In exploring twentieth-century French repertoire, it is common to see inscriptions “à Jean Devémy.”  As horn professor at the renowned Paris Conservatory for over thirty years, from 1937 to 1969, Devémy had a powerful influence on the development of horn playing and repertoire in France in the twentieth-century.  Thirty-one pieces from twenty-six composers, all French, were commissioned as examination pieces during Devémy’s tenure at the Paris Conservatory.  Only two have become standard pieces in the American repertoire:  Bozza’s En Forêt and the Françaix Divertimento.  The remaining twenty-nine pieces are of mixed quality, but hidden in this collection are works that deserve more recognition and exposure and that reflect the rich heritage left by M. Devémy. 

Jean Devémy was born in 1898 in Valenciennes, a French city located near the Belgian border.  Initially, he was attracted to the oboe, but the horn teacher at the Conservatoire de Valenciennes, Arthur Cantin, had a “friendly and noble air,” so Devémy chose to study with him instead.  In 1921, he won the Premier prix by unanimous vote at the Paris Conservatory in the class of François Bremond and began his career, playing principal horn with the Colonne Orchestra and the band of the Republican Guard.  As a member of the Quintet of Soloists of the Republican Guard, he traveled throughout France and much of Europe, giving over one hundred fifty concerts.  For many young French musicians, the idea of becoming a uniformed member of the Musique de la Garde represented the ultimate prestige, as many of the professors from the Paris Conservatory played in its ranks, creating a veritable showcase of the excellence of French wind playing.  Devémy remained with the group throughout his career and welcomed several of his students as his colleagues in the horn section.