Composer Spotlight—Margaret Bonds
by Caiti Beth McKinney
Hi everyone!
This month, I’ll be sharing about another orchestral composer, Chicago-born Margaret Bonds. Born in 1913, Bonds was an integral part of the African American arts and cultural movement known as the Chicago Black Renaissance. You may recognize the name of one of Bonds’ dear friends and musical companions, composer Florence Price (1887-1953). In fact, Bonds was such a skilled pianist that she performed Price’s Piano Concerto in 1933 with the Chicago Symphony at the World’s Fair, making her the first African American woman to be featured as a soloist with a major American symphony orchestra.
Lately, Bonds is becoming a household name for vocalists and choral directors thanks to her extensive compositional output for voice, but she also composed several substantial pieces for orchestra, musical theater, and piano. Many of her works were written in collaboration with noted poet, author, and fellow member of the Chicago Renaissance, Langston Hughes (1901-1967), by setting his words to music.
When it comes to the horn, orchestral music doesn’t get more brass-heavy than the opening of Margaret Bonds’ Montgomery Variations (1964). Trumpets, horns, and trombones perform the unbroken and unapologetic melody based on the Negro spiritual I Want Jesus to Walk with Me, while the strings punctuate with accented bursts of sound. For a piece about the Civil Rights movement and the bravery of Black Americans who fought for their rights and equality, Bonds’ emphatic use of the brass is incredibly appropriate for the first movement, which she titled Decision, named after Black Americans’ decision to defy the infamous Jim Crow laws of the South. The piece is named after the Montgomery bus boycotts of the mid-1950s and was written in the immediate aftermath of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing of 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama. Very recently, Bonds’ work has been garnering recordings and performances by orchestras like the Boston Symphony and Minnesota Orchestra, but it is still, unfortunately, relatively unknown in the broader orchestral world.
Chamber Music Corner—Joachim Nicolas Eggert’s Sextet in F minor
by Layne Anspach
Hello musicians!
Joachim Nicolas Eggert (1779-1813) was a Swedish composer and conductor, born in Gingst, Rügen, which is now part of Germany. Eggert started his formal musical studies in Stralsund and Brunswick; he held his first music director post in Mecklenburg-Schwerin in 1802. Shortly after, he left for Sweden as he took a position in the Royal Court Orchestra, first as a violinist (1803-07), then as the hovkapellmästare (chief conductor; 1808-12). Eggert’s health deteriorated during the winter of 1813 and, shortly thereafter, he died at the age of 34.
Eggert focused most of his chamber writing on string music: a string sextet, a piano quartet, and at least twelve string quartets. He also wrote a sextet for clarinet, horn, violin, viola, cello, and bass, which will be our focus. It is hypothesized that the work was inspired by Beethoven’s Septet, op. 20, as the septet was quite popular in Stockholm during this time. The work was to be performed on a concert in May 1807 but was not performed when some of the musicians became ill.
Written in a sonata form, the first movement, Adagio - Allegro, begins with the lowest strings in a somber, slow introduction. The horn then interjects the first theme, and a second theme is presented by the clarinet and violin. The development is melodically carried by the clarinet and violin while being pushed forward by the low strings. The recapitulation is marked, as expected, by the return of the first theme. In a change from the exposition, the horn and violin play the second theme, with the clarinet eventually taking over from the horn.
The second movement, Adagio, begins, in a similar fashion to the first, with the low strings. The clarinet emerges with the melody, periodically relinquishing the role to others as the movement progresses, but always regaining it. In the closing, the horn is heard with a countermelody as the clarinet brings the movement to a gentle conclusion.
The Menuetto follows the compound ternary form typical of a minuet and trio. The menuetto starts, yet again, with the low strings, but it is quickly spurred on by the clarinet and violin, either in tandem or in turn. The trio is characterized by a lighter, quieter character. The violin and clarinet alternate two-note figures while the horn plays a running passage. The trio continues with the three top voices carrying the melodic content before the da capo.
The Finale is a light and quick concluding movement. Interspersed with fermati which allow the movement to restart at regular intervals, the clarinet and violin present the vast majority of the melodic content. Sprightly passages jolt additional excitement into the movement, which concludes in a familiar classical style.
The reference recording is by the Consortium Classicum.
The Ambitious Amateur—Efficient Playing
by Marty Schlenker
Dear Fellow Amateurs,
Last month, I shared some of the results of a longer stretch of daily practice than my business travel had been allowing. I was able to make some progress reshaping my oral cavity, with positive effects to tone and flexibility. I have a much longer journey ahead to strengthen my embouchure after many years of substituting large muscles for small muscles, basically squashing my lips onto the mouthpiece to achieve a narrow aperture.
This month, I’d like to stay with the subject of horn playing as physical activity. We all know and appreciate that horn playing is physical. We’ve concluded marathon rehearsals with sore ribs, swollen embouchures, and, ideally, a sense of relief, appreciation for the music we helped make, and the satisfaction that comes from having accomplished something.
And yet, as I’ve resumed lessons and paid new attention to playing tips I discover on the internet and elsewhere, the subject of efficiency has come up more and more often. We pursue efficiency not to expend less effort, but to maximally realize the effort we expend as musical effect.
After 16 months of living in central Pennsylvania, I finally caught the Harrisburg Symphony, attending two premier performances of the oratorio Saul by Jonathan Leshnoff. The symphony was joined by the Susquehanna Chorale and the Messiah University Concert Choir.
It was a big work, with fine horn writing and equally fine execution by the Harrisburg section. With choirs, the typical complement of orchestral winds, and a very large string section, the horns had a challenge to be present but not strident, or at least only strident when called for. They worked hard, and the performance worked musically.
What I took home from this is a reminder that, in seeking to become a more efficient player, I should not let down my effort on breathing. Early in my latest lessons, I’d received feedback that I was overplaying. Between that, and concentrating hard on the tonguing, oral cavity, and embouchure changes also underway, breathing had taken a back seat. This wasn’t deliberate, but my visit to Harrisburg made me think, “Am I doing what they’re doing?” In the breathing department, the answer was no. So, I picked up my effort, and it seems to be helping. In many contexts, we hear “work smarter, not harder.” In my playing, “work smarter, but work nonetheless” seems to fit.
Coincidentally, the May 2024 edition of Marilyn B. Kloss’ Cornucopia newsletter has an interesting piece by Dylan Skye Hart on breathing physiology, Breathing with the Whole Body. It’s a quick read and includes additional resources.
I’ll close by asking you all once again to get in touch and share your own journeys as amateur hornists. You know things that can help others. Share your gifts. marty.schlenker@cavaliers.org.
Your servant and kindred spirit,
Marty Schlenker, Amateur Hornist
Meet the People—Andrew Pelletier, IHS Past President
by Andrew Pelletier
I was very honored and a little amused that Mike Harcrow and the Horn and More team wanted to do a “Meet the People” feature with me—I'm always stunned when anyone shows interest in what I've done and try to do with the horn, believing that there are several thousand horn players more deserving or interesting than myself, but I'll try my best....
I was born and raised in Maine, in the Northeast of the USA, and started playing the horn in sixth grade. I quit through junior high school (I could not afford a horn and the school didn't have one for me to borrow) but picked it back up in senior high and have been trying to perfect it ever since. I attended the University of Southern Maine (GO HUSKIES!) for my undergraduate studies and found myself, at 18, playing in the Portland Symphony Orchestra, Maine's only professional orchestra. I played with the PSO for 5 seasons (undergrad plus one gap year), before heading to Los Angeles for graduate study with James Decker at the University of Southern California, earning my master’s degree in 1998 and the Doctor of Musical Arts in 2001. While in L.A. I was super lucky to freelance quite frequently, including for television and feature film studio recording sessions. I also played principal horn for the Santa Barbara Symphony and taught at a few community colleges. In 2004, I moved to Bowling Green, Ohio, to become the horn professor at Bowling Green State University. In my time at BGSU so far, I have played principal horn in Ann Arbor, Michigan (for 11 seasons), and principal horn for the Michigan Opera Theatre in Detroit (for 16 seasons), and I have been a frequent substitute player with the Toledo Symphony, Detroit Symphony, and the ProMusica Chamber Orchestra, in Columbus, Ohio. BGSU named me a Professor of Creative Arts Excellence in 2020, and I was elected the Chair of the Department of Music Performance Studies in 2023.
Now, my deep love and care of the IHS goes all the way to the very beginning, leafing through my former teacher's collection of old issues of The Horn Call. I was (and am) so excited by the history, the traditions, the personalities, and the music of our great instrument. I attended my first IHS Symposium in 1997 at the Eastman School of Music (bravo, Peter Kurau!), thanks to the Jon Hawkins Memorial Scholarship, and I was hooked. The IHS kindly gave me a platform to experiment as a solo artist, usually bringing new pieces I'd commissioned, and I've been lucky to perform at 12 Symposia (thus far—see you in July!) and have commissioned and premiered over 60 works for our instrument. I've made lifelong friends through the IHS, and I always come away from IHS events charged up to learn more, to try new things, to experiment. One of the greatest honors of my life was when I was elected President of the IHS, starting in 2018. It was a challenge to keep the Society healthy and moving forward during covid, but thanks to the extraordinary staff, volunteers, and the hard work of the Advisory Council, I feel like we escaped the pandemic in a good position for growth. I've been involved with the IHS for almost 30 years, now, and although I am currently enjoying a bit of a break in official duties for the Society, I know that this won't last forever, and I look forward to any opportunity I may have to help it grow and prosper, and help to inspire and develop horn players and teachers the world over. I am immensely proud to be an IHS Life Member, and I am always thankful for what the IHS has done for me.
The Ambitious Amateur
by Marty Schlenker
Dear Fellow Amateurs,
It’s been several months since I devoted a column to my journey in resuming lessons in middle age. So…how’s it been going?
In previous columns, I’ve shared the advice that helped me the most the fastest, including repositioning my tongue farther back and reshaping my air column to be narrower and rounder, as if it were a straw that I was holding between my lips. Making these changes has enabled the fronts of my notes to be less percussive with the tongue, and they have made it easier for notes to speak.
I alluded to but didn’t really describe other guidance which I know will be good in the long run but which was really challenging at first. It was said in several different ways, but the common concept is that I was exerting too much of my whole body in the attempt to get notes, especially in passages containing large interval changes. This manifested in small ways (eyebrows) and large (clenched shoulders), but fundamentally, it was a substitute for work that should have been done by facial muscles within the mouthpiece ring.
The advice, “keep still outside the mouthpiece ring, no matter what the register or interval” has proven quite difficult, especially right after travel-induced practice breaks. The “hefting” I was doing was only delaying the development of a broadly capable embouchure. Quelling this movement made sense, but it took a while to find any kind of substitute.
Practice breaks…. My business travel slowed down significantly in March and April. The circumstances of my employer weren’t great, so this wasn’t planned; but the silver lining was the longest continuous stretch of practice days since I resumed lessons. With daily conditioning rather than a couple sessions a week, it became easier to summon air from my lower torso, and I could start to make melodic jumps while maintaining a more relaxed upper body.
That’s not to say that this is a resolved issue. Far from it. I would estimate I’m not even a quarter of the way to the embouchure strengthening that I think I need. But it’s a start. Here are some of the “case-in-point” passages newly attained (most of the time, anyway):
Mueller (ed. Chambers) Vol. 2 #23:
Kling #4, in the style of Rossini:
There’s lots more to report that will have to wait until future columns: I acquired another horn and have some things to say about it. I was invited to conduct a trombone ensemble and overcame some self-doubt. I attended the world premiere of Jonathan Leshnoff’s oratorio Saul and made a playing adjustment inspired by the horns of the Harrisburg Symphony.
Fellow amateurs, have you resumed lessons? Are they helping? How? Please write and share your stories; this column will be better for it. marty.schlenker@cavaliers.org
Your servant and kindred spirit,
Marty Schlenker, Amateur Hornist
Pedagogy Column—The Articulators
by Mike Harcrow
To articulate is to make distinct, more so or less so in music as the style and other aspects of a performing situation (acoustics, number of players, etc.) may require. A very basic articulation diagram for musical styles of the Classical and Romantic eras might look something like this:
How wind players accomplish these (and other) indicators is considered a function primarily of the tongue. If we think more thoroughly about what really happens as we articulate, however, we will discover at least five articulation activators: the tongue, the fingers, the rotors, the lips, and airflow.
THE TONGUE
A horn player’s tone is distinctive, in great part, because our bells face away from the audience and we have our hands placed in them for functional purposes (the subject of another discussion), including tone control and manipulation…not to mention playing nearly into our own concert attire and, possibly, into curtains! These factors contribute to some disadvantages in performance, most notably (in light of this discussion) to a loss in the clarity of tonguing.
Most horn players use a letter “T” as their articulation consonant—and occasionally a letter “D” if a more lyrical passage is made more beautiful by using the softer articulation. I was once, however, quite shocked and disappointed in listening back to a recording of myself in a performance of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 in which all the repeated pitches in the famous solo were so unclear because of my choice to tongue softly that the measures [mm. 11, 15, 19, and 23] sounded like long tones rather than distinct rhythms!
Tonguing must not be mushy; neither ought it be harsh or explosive. The default concept for tonguing should be clarity.
THE FINGERS
Tonguing is quite often done while fingering different notes. If the tongue and fingers are not perfectly coordinated, the effect of articulating is that of popcorn popping. We must develop an ergonomically comfortable left-hand position that is relaxed—remembering that the hand is attached to the wrist and the wrist to the arm, in order to avoid any possibility of developing carpal tunnel syndrome or any other repeated stress injury—while maximizing our ability to move the fingers quickly in synchronization with the tongue. “Fly-away” fingers or fingers flattened onto the rotor levers are not efficient in their movement, so a grip which can hold an overripe tomato without rupturing it is most desirable. The fact that a majority of horn players have a dominant right hand, moreover, means that most of us have a bit more to overcome in developing the best facility in finger-tongue coordination. The easy solution is to practice single and multiple tonguing daily in conjunction with valve work (starting with scales).
THE ROTORS
Closely related to the fingers as articulators are the instrument’s rotors (or valves), since these are what the fingers operate. What really needs to be said here is that rotors must work well. Rotors must be well oiled so that they are quick (light oil) and quiet (more viscous oil). Linkages, mechanical or string, must be in excellent repair. Neoprene, rubber, or cork bumpers must be placed and trimmed so that the rotors open and close with the best possible internal alignment, and they should be neither too squishy nor too hard.
THE LIPS
Most of us will agree that every single pitch we play has a different and distinct “buzz.” The generation of sound by the aperture is how brass players create pitch; placement or positioning of the pitch in the buzzing aperture is how we accomplish note changes, with or without valves, and, to some extent, pitch control. I recall sitting in the front row in a small concert hall in Seoul, South Korea, to watch a very famous colleague conduct his own performance of a difficult modern horn concerto played from memory. In getting the chamber orchestra started, he completely mis-fingered much of the challenging opening passage yet still got every note right! That is the power of the buzz.
AIRFLOW
None of the first four articulators work their best without optimum airflow. Indeed, there is no buzz without it; but we must also use a copious amount of air for both power and nuance. Our entire torsos function as big air pumps. Additionally, as we read in chapter 2 of the well-known Yogi Science of Breath (made known to American brass players by Arnold Jacobs), “breath is life,” that is, oxygen makes every functioning part of our bodies work well. How much do we need the focus and concentration to multi-task as performers, the energy for the creation of sound and for stamina, and generosity of tone and beauty! We are generating little tornados in our horns every time we play well. Air is foundational to what we do; air gets us—as articulation masters—and the music going.
Student Column—The Career Hunt: Music Professor
by Inman Hebert
So You Think You Want to be A Music Professor….
As students, many of us work with college professors who mentor us through our development as horn players. As we progress on our journeys, we look at potential careers to pursue after graduation. One excellent option is following in the footsteps of our mentors and becoming teachers ourselves. In this exploration, what should horn students consider before choosing to pursue the collegiate career path?
If interested in becoming a music professor, searching for and analyzing job announcements can help inform one’s decision process. The search will yield results from conservatories to private and public institutions, both liberal arts colleges and universities, that are not always close to a metropolis or existing family connections, and distance can be crucial in the decision-making process for some.
Often, the types of jobs available do not match our ideals. Non-tenure track lecturer and instructor positions with contracts that typically span one to three years far outnumber tenure-track positions with ascending ranks of Assistant Professor, Associate Professor, and Professor. While some positions may be less than full-time in conjunction with performing, adjunct instructors, by definition, are part-time positions hired to fulfill a particular and limited role. Though success in a performance career may supersede some requirements, most announcements list a minimum requirement of a master’s degree while many dictate a terminal degree such as a DMA.
If these initial job searches do not dampen one’s interest, then what must a horn student understand about becoming a professor? By reading biographies of music professors online and talking with those in the field, students will discover that the path to becoming a music professor is a unique journey filled with many twists and turns. The path is rarely a straight line but one that is often a pursuit of passion with dedication. In addition to being extremely competitive, it may involve multiple steps, often beyond our initial expectations, and will often take more time than we may currently imagine. While no single path exists, our adaptability and receptiveness to any and all opportunities start now while we are students.
A professorship encompasses a broad range of duties far beyond the requisite education and the proficiency to play the horn at a high level of accomplishment. Students must ask themselves if they desire to teach and mentor others. Those who respond in the affirmative must invest the time to develop their communication skills. Not all students learn in the same manner, and professors with empathy and understanding will meet students where they are in their role as mentors to communicate in a way that is helpful to the students in their development. The ability to communicate well manifests not only in lessons but also in lecturing, advising, recruiting prospective students, and interacting with colleagues. Early in their education, students should seek opportunities to observe and internalize what succeeds in master classes, private lessons, and studios, while more experienced students should be provided opportunities to start working with others.
For many musicians, writing is an undervalued form of communication that students can work to improve. Whether promoting yourself in a curriculum vitae and cover letter for a position, writing about your research, or advertising on your own or on a college website, writing can be an asset that provides a first impression as a candidate and shows that you are knowledgeable, credible, professional, and organized.
While college professors must maintain a commitment to teaching, skills needed may extend to finding and recruiting students, administrating a studio, teaching private lessons, conducting ensembles, developing music history or pedagogy or other courses, mentoring students beyond lessons, maintaining an active research profile, and performing. More and more, professors are also required to serve institutions in governance (like committee work, particularly at smaller liberal arts colleges), assessment, state and national accreditation processes, department-oriented administrative work (such as budgeting, planning and scheduling, etc.) and/or administrative roles (department chairs, deans, etc.), implementing DEI initiatives, creating new degrees or altering existing ones, and so on. Much of this comes as on-the-job training for which students pursuing a professorship must be aware but also agreeable to learn. These unexpected aspects of a teaching career are challenging but also educational and enriching.
Those seeking to become a music professor should excel on the horn and enjoy all aspects of music. The diversity of the students and the roles performed will be as varied as the mission of the position. Applicants can never know what will get a search committee’s attention, so they should take advantage of any opportunity which can broaden their skill sets. Search committees are looking for a peer who can perform service and contribute to the success of their music program. As students, we must decide if we have the interest, adaptability, and dedication to pursue this career path.
