Lowell Shaw (1930-2025)
Most horn players are familiar with the Fripperies, Quipperies, Tripperies, etc. of Lowell ("Spike") Shaw. Spike made these and other arrangements and compositions available through his publishing company, The Hornists' Nest, and Spike could be found at an exhibit table at most international symposiums and many regional workshops.
Spike was born in 1930 in Joliet IL. Both his parents were amateur performers who believed in the value of musical training. His father brought a horn home when Spike was in the sixth grade, a rental from Lyon and Healy in Chicago. Spike had been studying piano for several years with little enthusiasm. After a few months, his grade school teacher sent him to a trombonist, Jaroslav Cimera, with whom Spike studied until his senior year in high school, when he studied with Max Pottag. When Spike was a high school sophomore, he played second horn to Jim Winter in the Oak Park-River Forest Symphony when Jim was working on an advanced degree at Northwestern University. That association sparked Spike's interest in making horn his career.
Spike earned a bachelor's degree from Northwestern University in 1951, continuing his studies with Max Pottag, who stressed musical playing in their large horn ensembles. A smaller group met on its own. Some arrangements for that group are now in the Hornists' Nest catalog. After graduation, Spike played in the US Air Force Band at Sampson AFB near Geneva NY for four years. The members were encouraged to arrange music for the many groups within the organization; "It became a four-year lab course in playing and writing," remembers Spike. Occasionally the dance bands were short a trombone, and Spike filled in, learning how to play the uneven eights that are the basis of the Fripperies.
Spike went back to Northwestern for a master's degree. Philip Farkas was then the horn teacher, and he guided Spike in changing his embouchure. In 1956, Spike started auditioning and won the position of second horn in the Buffalo Philharmonic, where he stayed until 1994. He started teaching at the University of Buffalo in 1957 and founded The Hornists' Nest in 1964.
Asked about the origins of the Fripperies, Spike explained, "The first Frippery was written as an exercise for my horn students at the University of Buffalo. For several years I was the band director at UB as well as the horn instructor. There was interest among the band students in forming a dance band, and, as there weren't too many charts available at that time, I began writing arrangements for the group. As long as I was going to be at the rehearsals anyway, I added a horn part to the standard big band instrumentation so I could play along. The horn students were eager to have the chance to participate, and we were soon using a horn section of four players. Rather than let them embarrass themselves the way I had when I first had the chance to play that style music, it seemed best to give them some small exposure to particularly the eighth-note patterns that are so different from what we had experienced in the Kopprasch books. My aim was to give them some idea where those pesky final off-the-beat eights fall within the uneven swing notation."
The name "frippery" came about because "I was looking for something to suggest the frivolous, fun, light-hearted nature of the music. The word 'fripperies' came to mind, and it was several years later when I finally looked up the real meaning of the word. Something about a cheap, showy bauble of little intrinsic worth was the nicest of the definitions. Somehow, it stuck."
Spike organized his university students into a horn choir as he was convinced, from his experience with Pottag, that the ensemble was a good teaching tool. Area professionals and high school students joined, forming the Buffalo Horn Club, which played some of the LA Horn Club arrangements as well as original compositions. A member who was moving away suggested that, instead of copying the arrangements just once for his future use, they start a publishing venture in 1964. "Four of us put up $100 each, talked to a lawyer, ran off some copies of HN 1, 2, and 3, and then mailed a copy of the Five Bach Trios to all the horn players we could think of. The business gradually grew from there. … Two of the original investors left the area and one took a break from the horn, so I was left doing most of the chores. Gradually it became clear that it was really a one-man operation and I bought the others out. What started out as a spare time activity now keeps me quite occupied in my retirement."
In addition to the Fripperies, the first of which were written in the 1960s and by 2010 numbered 40, Spike wrote 19 Bipperies, 4 Tripperies, 8 Quipperies, and 13 Just Desserts (for solo horn) with optional string bass parts.
Spike arranged many other works for horn choir. "The name Bach seems to show up quite frequently in our catalog. There is rarely a dull line in a Bach composition. Each voice is always heading somewhere."
In 2010, Spike said, “I feel fortunate that I discovered an unfilled niche and had the background and experience to take advantage of it. I still enjoy playing in horn ensembles, attending workshops, and keeping in touch with the many friends I have made through music.”
Spike received the Punto award at the 1990 symposium at Eastern Illinois University and was elected an Honorary Member at the 2010 symposium in Brisbane, Australia. An interview with him appears in the February 2000 issue of The Horn Call and an extensive tribute in the April 2026 issue.
Xiao-Ming Han
At the age of 10 Xiao-Ming Han began studying horn with his father, Xianguang Han, a renowned Chinese horn professor and prizewinner at the Geneva International Horn Competition in 1960. After graduating from the Academy affiliated with the China Central Philharmonic Orchestra and Beijing's Central Conservatory of Music at the age of 17, Xiao-Ming Han was appointed principal horn of the China Central Philharmonic Orchestra.
Conductor Seiji Ozawa visited China in 1979 and was impressed by Han's talent. He invited Han to attend the Tanglewood Music Center in the United States, and as a result, Han studied with Richard Mackey (member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra) at New England Conservatory. In 1983 Han won the first prize at the International Horn Competition organized by the International Horn Society.
In 1984, upon receiving a scholarship from the Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD), he studied with Ifor James at the Freiburg University of Music, and with Otto Schmitz at the Munich University of Music, where he earned a Master of Arts degree in 1986. Three months after arriving in Germany, at age 22, Han was appointed principal horn of the Würzburg Philharmonic Orchestra and later that year principal horn of the German Radio Philharmonic Orchestra.
Han has participated in music festivals such as the Salzburg Music Festival, Würzburg Mozart Music Festival, Saito Kinen Festival, and the Marlboro Music Festival, where he collaborated with Midori Goto, Mitsuko Uchida, and Hilary Hahn. He has performed as guest principal with orchestras such as the Berlin Philharmonic, Vienna Philharmonic, and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra.
In 1993, at the age of 30, Han became the youngest and only Asian professor of horn in Germany, at the University of Music Saarland until 2011. Han has presented masterclasses in the US, Australia, Japan, Singapore, and Europe, and a regular guest professor at the Central Conservatory of Music (CCOM) in Beijing and the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.
Han has promoted international collaboration in classical music through the annual Music Festival of the CCOM (2004-2010) and the first Chamber Music Festival in the China National Center for the Performing Arts (NCPA) in Beijing; he was invited to establish an orchestra-in-residence at the NCPA.
Upon returning to Germany, Han toured with the Berlin Philharmonic in Europe and with the Royal Philharmonic in China, performed at the Surrey Hills International Music Festival, London and with the Sydney Opera Orchestra. He has also given several solo, chamber, and orchestra performances in China, Taiwan, and Korea.
Two solo recordings were released by Oehms Classics, and in 2016 Han adjudicated the ARD Competition in Munich.
Han was honored with the Punto Award in 2025.
Gregory Hustis
Gregory Hustis was principal horn (1976-2012) and principal horn emeritus (2012-2014) of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and adjunct professor of horn at Southern Methodist University in Dallas since 1977. Professor Hustis is an active conductor, educator, and advocate for the arts.
A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, Hustis has performed as a concerto soloist with numerous orchestras. In 1995, he received the Meadows Foundation Distinguished Teaching Award. As a clinician, chamber music player, and recitalist, he has been a featured guest artist at many international festivals, including Sarasota, Mainly Mozart, and Music in the Mountains in Durango, Colorado, where he was Festival Artistic Advisor and Chamber Music Director (1997-2022).
In addition to the scores of orchestral recordings he has made as principal horn of the Dallas Symphony, Hustis can be heard as a soloist and chamber music player on various labels, including Eric Ewazen's Concerto for Horn and String Orchestra, James Becktel's The Glass Bead Game, and Simon Sargon's Questionings with the Dallas Philharmonia.
He also has served on numerous boards and advisory committees, including those of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Greater Dallas Youth Orchestra, International Horn Society, American Horn Competition, Voices of Change, Blue Candlelight Series, Dallas Center for the Performing Arts Foundation, and Dallas Chamber Music Society, where he has served as president.
Hustis was a co-founder of TrumCor, which manufactures and distributes mutes for brass instruments.
Hustis was honored with the Punto Award in 2025.
Sören Hermansson
Sören Hermansson is internationally known as a performer, recording artist, and educator. He studied in Stockholm, Amsterdam, and West-Berlin (Karajan-Academy) and has held orchestral positions in the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra and Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra. Since 1988, Hermansson has devoted his time to his solo career and teaching. His performances have taken him to North and South America, and to several countries in Europe.
He has taught at the Academy of Music and Drama, University of Gothenburg, Ingesund School of Music, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and between 1999-2006 was the horn professor at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He has given masterclasses all over the US and Europe, and is a frequent guest in Brazil. He is currently teaching in the Chamber Music Program at Mälardalen University, Västerås, Sweden.
Hermansson has commissioned and premiered around 60 works for horn. He has recorded many of these works to wide critical acclaim. Among these recordings are world premieres of works by Anders Eliasson, Folke Rabe, Pehr-Henrik Nordgren, and a TV-production of the Bengt Hambreus Horn Concerto. His catalog of recordings also includes two albums on the BIS label: Horn and Harp Soiree, with harpist Erica Goodman, and Horn Concertos by Gordon Jacob, Lars-Erik Larsson, Mátyás Seiber, Max Reger, and Kurt Atterberg.
In recent years, Hermansson has focused on commissioning new works for horn and electronics. Composers such as Marie Samuelsson, Leilei Tian, Per Mårtensson, Joakim Sandgren, Åke Parmerud, Marcus Fjellström, Fredrik Olofsson, and Tommy Zwedberg have written works for him.
The Punto Award was bestowed on Hermansson in 2025.
André Cazalet
André Cazalet began studying music at an early age, and was awarded two first prizes from the Conservatoire National Superieur de Musique in Paris. After performing as a soloist for Pierre Boulez's Ensemble InterContemporain, he joined the Orchestre de Paris as solo horn in 1980, a position from which he recently retired. His active solo career has led to performances conducted by Christoph Eschenbach, Paavo Järvi, Semyon Bychkov, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Peter Eotvos, John Nelson, Michel Plasson, Antonio Papano, and Walter Weller.
A highly sought-after chamber musician, he has performed alongside Daniel Barenboim, the Talich Quartet, Pascal Rogé, Gérard Caussé, Maurice Bourgue, Katia et Marielle Labèque, Jean Pierre Rampal, Emmanuel Pahud, Schlomo Mintz, Christoph Eschenbach, Pierre Laurent Aimard, Christian Tetziaff, Boris Berezovsky, and Julian Rachlin.
His repertoire stretches from the 18th century to the present day, and he has collaborated with numerous contemporary composers. He is the dedicatee for several works for horn. Having taught at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris since 1985, he has been invited to teach at some of the world's greatest establishments: the Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, the Rimsky-Korsakov St. Petersburg State Conservatory, the universities in Vienna and Tokyo, Hamburg's Musikhochschule, in Freiburg, Munich and beyond.
His discography includes concerti by Haydn and Leopold Mozart, while his album featuring trios by Brahms and Ligeti for piano, violin and horn and was awarded the Grand Prix du Disque. Nominated for the Victoires de la Musique in 2011, André Cazalet is a Chevalier of the French Order of the Arts and Letters.
André Cazalet was given a Punto Award in 2024.
Susan McCullough
Susan McCullough served for 22 years as principal/third horn in the Colorado Springs Symphony Orchestra and on the faculty of the Lamont School of Music at the University of Denver (1996-2018) and is highly esteemed as both a performer and an educator.
McCullough earned a bachelor's degree in horn performance from Emporia State University in Emporia, Kansas in 1975. She was principal horn and soloist of the Air Force Academy Band in Colorado Springs (1975-1979). She was a member of the Aries Brass Quintet (1996-2008) is a founding member of the Denver Brass (since the first concert in 1981). She toured the US as principal horn with the Swiss chamber orchestra Lucerne Festival Strings in 2003. She is on faculty of the Rafael Mendez Brass Institute (since 2007), the Lamont Academy (since 2208), and the Kendall Betts Horn Camp (since 2021).
McCullough performs with many of Colorado's ensembles and with operas and shows that tour to Denver, considered the number one freelance horn player in the region. She is a soloist and recording artist (often with her son, Jesse McCormick, second horn in the Cleveland Orchestra). She has been a featured soloist and clinician across the US and around the world, including in South African National Symposiums since 2007.
Her valuable contributions to the IHS include serving on the Advisory Council (2008-2014 and 2017-2024), as a featured artist at many symposiums, and as host of the 2008 IHS Symposium in Denver, which set attendance records.
McCullough was given the Punto Award in 2024.
David Duke (d. 2024)
David Duke played in the UCLA band in the 1950s and was sought after in Hollywood studios since the 1960s. He was a member of the Westwood Wind Quintet and played with ensembles such Henry Mancini, the Monterey Jazz Orchestra, Neil Norman, and the Abnuceals Emuukha Eletric Orchestra (organized by Frank Zappa).
David performed with countless artists and composers for over four decades, including Cannonball Adderley, Teresa Brewer, Dizzy Gillespie, Randy Newman, Kenny Rogers, Arturo Sandoval, Doc Severinsen, John Williams, and Nancy Wilson. Recordings include The Beach Boys, The Carpenters, Natlie Cole, Judy Collins, Miles Davis, John Denver, Neil Diamond, Ella Fitzgerald, Quincy Jones, Johnny Mathis, Prince, and Frank Sinatra.
Movie soundtracks include Agent Cody Banks, Along Came a Spider, Cats and Dogs, The Chronicles of Riddick, Collateral Damage, The Color Purple, Constantine, Dragonfly, Dreamcatcher, Elf, King Kong, The Legend of Zorro, Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events, Looney Tunes: Back in Action, Meet the Fockers, Panic Room, Paycheck, Peter Pan, Red Dawn, Rocky II, Star Trek: Nemesis, Under the Tuscan Sun, and War of the Worlds.
Fred Fox (1914-2019)
Fred Fox was honored at age 97 with the Punto Award at the 2011 International Horn Symposium in San Francisco. At the symposium, Fred presented an inspiring early morning session on playing accurately by applying the “hanging lip” or “sure shot” principle. He enlivened a panel discussion with his Hollywood colleagues Jim Decker, George Hyde, Alan Robinson, and Gene Sherry. His book Essentials of Brass Playing has been a bible for not only horn players but other brass players as well since its publication in 1974.
Fred was born in Brooklyn NY and studied violin before he took up horn. He graduated from Juilliard and studied with Robert Schulze, Joseph Franzl, and Bruno Jaenicke. He was first horn in the National Symphony (1931-32), Minneapolis (1934-37), and Los Angeles (1944-46, following Alfred Brain), and then solo horn with the Paramount and RKO studios. He also played with the Chautauqua Symphony (1934) and toured with Xavier Cugat (1954), Stan Kenton (1956), and the Roger Wagner Chorale (1965).
One time when Fred was first horn in the Minneapolis orchestra and Ormandy was the conductor in Tchaikovsky's 5th Symphony, the dress rehearsal went poorly and Fred was called to the office. The concert was terrific and all the orchestra wondered what Ormandy had said to him. Ormandy told them, “I simply said he was good and not to worry.”
Fred taught at the University of Southern California, Music Academy of the West (Santa Barbara), Pepperdine College, and California State University in Los Angeles and Northridge. His students include Howard Hillyer, Henry Sigismonti, Hyman Markowitz, Daniel Katzen, Jim Thatcher, and Richard Linenhahn.
After retiring from playing in 1969, Fred and his wife traveled extensively. Fred continued teaching part-time because he enjoyed it, but although he practiced, he “found life more interesting not worrying about jobs.” An early experience affected his outlook. At a lesson in 1930 with Bruno Jaenicke, Jaenicke told him, “Today we had a new conductor in the Philharmonic, and he told me how to phrase the Tchaikovsky 5th horn solo. He was wrong. I would have stood up and resigned from the orchestra, I have enough money, but what would I do? Sit by the fireplace and become an old man?” Fred determined then that he would “leave horn playing before it left me.”
Fred contributed articles to The Horn Call: “The Key to High Notes on the Horn” (February 1971); “Playing a Simple Crescendo-Diminuendo on Middle ‘G’” (May 1971); “A ‘Sound’ Formula for the Hand Position in the Bell” (April 1979); “’Bull’s Eye’” (April 1981); “Decreasing ‘Clams,’ Increasing Virtuosity” (May 1998); and “1938 New York Philharmonic Horn Section” (February 2009). In addition to Essentials of Brass Playing, he published a book of poetry: Kaleidoscope: The Many Facets of an Octogenarian, Everett Press, 1998.
