Student Column—Protect Your Lips from Dryness
Understanding Lip Dehydration
by Inman Hebert
A recent polar vortex brought extremely low temperatures to much of the United States. Horn players from temperate-weather zones encountered record-breaking snow. Who thought 10 inches of snow would be seen in New Orleans? Whether an anomaly for your region or the standard for your area, some of us, including myself, are experiencing dry, chapped lips. Gaining insight into this phenomenon can help us protect ourselves and maintain consistency in our horn playing.
First, we must understand the concurrence of factors. As lips have only a thin protective barrier, they become easily susceptible to dehydration. Winter acts as a catalyst. Colder, low-humidity air, in combination with wind, creates conditions for dry, stiff lips. Buildings that provide relief from the bitter temperatures keep their heating systems running constantly, and this evaporates moisture out of the air. Breathing through the mouth while sleeping or because of sinus congestion leads to additional dryness.
Constant exposure to dry air, outdoors and indoors, dehydrates the lips and may cause pain, sores, and cracked skin. These conditions make the lips more prone to infection. Dryness and stiffness also affect the embouchure, decreasing flexibility when playing the horn.
What can be done? If your residence constantly has a heating system running, consider using a humidifier to add moisture back into your environment. While we consider wearing a jacket outside in the winter, covering the mouth with a scarf should be a priority. Avoid practicing or warming up outside in the cold weather. Drinking water throughout the day keeps your whole body hydrated and restores moisture to the lips. While licking the lips seems instinctive, it can have a detrimental effect: the digestive enzymes in saliva remove the protective layer on your lips, damage the skin, and, as the saliva dries, draw additional moisture from the lips.
Lip balms can help provide a protective barrier on the lips, but horn players should be cautious. Balms containing camphor, eucalyptus, menthol, or even aspirin may seem helpful initially but may also dry the lips faster and worsen dehydration. Some lip balms also contain chemicals which can irritate your lips over the long term. Search for ones that are more friendly to musicians’ lips.
Finally, whether walking across campus for a rehearsal or flying north for an audition, consider the weather and give yourself extra time to warm up. Even if you had your usual warm-up for the day but had to spend some time outdoors, give your lips additional time to warm up with lip slurs or buzzing exercises. Don’t go into a rehearsal, lesson, or audition “stone-cold.”
Pedagogy—Creative Practicing
by Adam Unsworth, IHS 57 Featured Artist
Each year, I offer a Jazz Horn Seminar to members of the studio at the University of Michigan. It’s quite basic and intended for horn players who are new to playing this style of music. While participation in this class often sparks interest in taking Jazz Improvisation 1, offered by our jazz faculty, the aim of the seminar is not necessarily to create future jazz horn players. Instead, my hope is to provide the horn students an opportunity to approach their instruments from a new angle and with a different mindset. The first step is to largely put aside written notation and rely more on our ears than our eyes. We begin with familiar diatonic warm-up exercises like scales and thirds while learning to play a credible swing feel. Continuing off the page, we memorize the melody and chord changes to a simple jazz standard (My Funny Valentine is our first tune this semester), talk about how to make sense of the chord progression while improvising, then use the melody as a launch pad to generate ideas.
This class includes plenty of listening. I find that great jazz melodists like Miles Davis, Chet Baker, Art Pepper, and Stan Getz, to name a few, are more relatable to us horn players than highly technical improvisers. We also explore many jazz horn recordings and enjoy the variety of highly personal sounds produced by these artists. It’s amazing the wide range of tone qualities produced when players aren’t concerned with fitting into an ensemble horn section. The ultimate goal of Jazz Horn Seminar is for students to begin to embrace the role of musical creator, rather than their customary role of musical re-creator, where notation serves as the rule book. This is quite a challenge for most horn students and a new skill that requires the willingness to take risks and be vulnerable in front of their colleagues. With practice and repeated reminders to view this musical world as one of freedom, most participants get a nice glimpse of what it’s like to let go and be the originator of their own ideas.
Jazz Horn Seminar is not mandatory and usually draws interest from six to eight Michigan horn students. Many others are too busy to add this class to their schedule or don’t have interest in jazz. So how can these concepts be applied to the classical repertoire students are preparing for lessons? A good place to start is to ask a student what music they listen to when they want to relax at the end of a long day. The answer, often not classical music, is a clue to what music truly speaks to them and is often music they enjoyed at a young age. Their deep connection to this music makes it innately comfortable, and most likely the style where personal expression will come easily. In my case, I grew up with a father who played jazz piano and listened to a lot of jazz at home as well as an older brother who was on the path to becoming an excellent jazz bassist. As a kid I heard plenty of jazz and had fun playing electric bass in the school big band but concentrated solely on classical music with the horn. Only later while in college did I realize that jazz horn felt close to home for me, and that expressing myself in this style came quite naturally. A memorable a-ha moment came with the realization that the physical and mental ease I experienced playing jazz could be applied to classical solos and orchestral excerpts. This insight was key to my personal path to audition success.
As teachers and performers, most of us have observed that works deemed important, i.e. Mozart concertos and standard orchestral excerpts, tend to take on a life of their own and can become more arduous than less prominent pieces. We tend to elevate standard repertoire because of the role it plays, or will play, in our audition and professional future. If I encounter a student who has the ability to play a familiar piece at a high level but is struggling with accuracy, energy, or musical expression, I encourage them to try a different approach, a pedagogical trick I call “Version B.” After their initial performance, we go back to the top and play the complete passage again, this time with a fresh interpretation. I tell them that the notes and rhythms are non-negotiable, but on their second attempt to experiment with all the other elements—tone, dynamics, tempo, articulation, phrasing, etc.—with the intent to create a new and spontaneously personal interpretation of this music. Essentially, the student is given permission to generate original musical ideas while continuing to play a piece that has become seemingly difficult and less enjoyable for them. It may take a couple of attempts before they have success with this unusual instruction, but most students get a hint of what it’s like to be inventive with a standard work and leave the lesson excited to try the approach further in the practice room. I should mention that despite my prodding, it is rare for a student to take their “Version B” rendition so far that the style of their Mozart concerto becomes unacceptable. Instead, while focused on the act of creating, their tone becomes more confident and personal while the phrasing expands and becomes more animated. The student’s attention has been drawn to interpreting the concerto rather than playing it perfectly, yet hours of practice, training, and instincts help them maintain the appropriate character. It is exciting to observe students as they renew their sense of freedom and fun with this familiar music. Once a student gets comfortable with the “Version B” approach, it can be applied to orchestral excerpts. Of course there is more to consider here, as being part of an ensemble requires solid knowledge of an excerpt’s musical context, close attention to detail, and the need to follow many years of established performance tradition. Score study and extensive listening are essential for younger players before adding one’s personal touch.
Beyond work with individual students, I’ve employed these concepts in our weekly horn studio class with a “Non-Classical Creative Project.” Students can choose to participate as solo performers, but more often form ensembles of varying sizes and perform as a group. The same instruction is given: consider the music you use to relax at the end of a long day, then write or arrange a short piece to play in class later in the term. Over the years, we’ve enjoyed original horn renditions of many pop tunes, movie music, and some country, rap, and hip-hop. Most importantly, this activity is purely fun and allows students to merge another style of music they love with their instrument. Although the following example doesn’t quite fit the assignment, one of my all-time favorite creative projects was conceived by a quartet of students who performed all four first movements of the Mozart concertos simultaneously! They each started at bar one of their respective concerto, counted their rests, entered when appropriate, and stopped when finished. The group began the performance without announcing the piece or concept, so it was a huge surprise, hilarious to everyone in the room, and even had some moments where it sounded respectable (when the person playing Concerto No. 1 in D was resting, of course).
I hope the concepts above can give performers, teachers, and students some food for thought when experiencing the potential monotony or burn-out associated with repetitive practicing. While repetition in the practice room is an absolute necessity for becoming the best horn players we can be, a little creativity can make a world of difference!
Adam Unsworth
Professor of Horn
School of Music, Theatre, and Dance
University of Michigan
Chamber Music Corner—Howard Buss’ Island of Enchantment: “Five Vignettes from Puerto Rico” (2022)
by Layne Anspach
Hello musicians! This month we will look at Howard Buss’ Island of Enchantment: “Five Vignettes from Puerto Rico” for flute, clarinet, horn, bassoon, and piano. Howard Buss (b. 1951) is an American composer whose work includes instrumental solos, chamber music, symphonic, choral, and band pieces. His works have been performed around the world.
Island of Enchantment was written for clarinetist Kathleen Jones and the 40th Anniversary of Camerata Caribe, and it was premiered on February 5, 2023, in San Juan. The work is in five movements descriptive of Puerto Rico. Sunrise Paints the Land starts with clarinet, flute, and piano presenting melodic content. A trill is passed between players during the opening section, after which the bassoon assumes the melodic lead followed by the clarinet with support from others. The movement is active until the final few bars where the ensemble moves together to conclude.
To the Shore ‘Arecibo’ brings the listener to the town of Arecibo, known for its scenic coastline. The movement opens with ascending patterns from the ensemble followed by the presentation of a short melodic element by bassoon which returns throughout. The A section alternates between busy, thickly scored sections and calm, tranquil ones. The faster B section shares themes between voices: piano, followed by flute, then bassoon. A shortened A section returns to close the movement. Glowing Waters ‘La Parguera’ refers to the bioluminescent waters found at La Parguera which attract tourists to view the nighttime glow. The slow movement is mysterious in nature, marked by dissonant and compact chords in the piano. After the introduction, the clarinet and flute propel the movement forward with short comments from the bassoon. The second section is in compound meter, and bassoon and piano share the melodic responsibility.
The Rain Forest ‘El Yunque’ brings the listener to El Yunque National Forest. The movement opens with four chords presented by the winds followed by an obbligato in the piano. Melodic entrances alternate between winds with staccato interjections. Eventually, the piano passes the obbligato to the flute and clarinet. The opening chords return as a transition to the second section which features cascading entrances of eighth notes between woodwinds and piano. The obbligato returns in the piano for a truncated A section to end the movement. Mongoosian Intrigues is the final movement of the work; while not native to Puerto Rico, mongooses were brought to the island to control rat populations. The movement starts with a tranquil opening but quickly turns to an aggressive and chaotic A section. A wind interlude sets up the B section, which is characterized by foreboding eighth notes in the piano’s left hand while the bassoon carries the melodic material. With little warning, the chaotic A section returns for an exciting conclusion.
Horn on Record—Volume 21: Hunting Songs for Male Chorus with the Horns of the Vienna State Opera
by Ian Zook
The rich tradition of choral singing had a pivotal touchstone in 1808 when composer and conductor Carl Friedrich Zelter formed the Singakadamie in Berlin. This group was limited to twenty-five singers who performed four-part songs and sought out new choral repertoire. Soon thereafter, Romantic era composers, including Schubert, Schumann, and Brahms, all composed interesting and evocative choral music that included horns. This month, we will listen to Forest and Hunting Songs of the Romantic Era, performed by the men’s chorus and the horns of the Vienna State Opera, released by The Musical Heritage Society in 1960.
The horn performers on this recording include Roland Berger, solo horn of the Vienna State Opera (coincidentally, this recording dates from his first year in that position at age 23), Friedrich Gabler, solo horn of the Vienna Volksopera and professor at the State Academy, and Roland Barr, Günter Högner, and Hans Fischer who played first, third, and fourth horns respectively in the State Opera. It is worth noting that the traditional membership of the Vienna Philharmonic is based primarily on performance with the State Opera. After successfully auditioning into the Opera and a three-year probationary period, members are then eligible to perform with the Vienna Philharmonic. Berger, Gabler, and Fischer were also students of Gottfried von Freiberg, the former solo horn of the Vienna Philharmonic.
Although this album has many selections which include horns, we will focus on two marvelous choral works, one each by Franz Schubert and Robert Schumann, which deserve our interest as performers.
Franz Schubert’s Nachtgesang im Walde (Nightsong in the Forest), D. 913 for four horns and men’s chorus, was premiered on April 22, 1827 for a benefit concert for famed hornist Josef Rudolf Lewy whose brother, Eduard, also performed. The following year on March 26, 1828, Schubert held a concert commemorating the first anniversary of Beethoven’s death. Once again, the Lewy brothers performed Nachtgesang im Walde, and Josef also premiered Auf dem Strom, D. 943 for tenor, horn, and piano, composed in honor of Beethoven.
Using text by German poet Johann Gabriel Siedle, Nachtgesang im Walde conjures an evocative soundscape of a woodland night that becomes alive with the encroaching dawn. The opening uses the horns’ sound both to reinforce the chorus and provide a gentle echoing effect, set to text descriptive of clandestine forest meetings, echoing steps, and silvery moon beams:
The mood shifts as the poem turns to the waking of dawn with the rousing sound of horns. A gallop ensues with descriptions of birds, deer, and swaying treetops punctuated by the choir’s articulation and the driving rhythm in the horns:
Robert Schumann is also well-known to hornists for his Adagio and Allegro, Op. 70 and the Konzertstück, Op. 86, both composed in his very productive compositional year of 1849. Less well-known are his Jagdlieder, Op. 137, a set of five songs for men’s chorus and horn quartet from May of the same year. The score calls for three Waldhörner with the 4th part designated for Ventilhorn. Schumann was pioneering in his use of valved horn, but likely chose the designation and assigned keys of F, E, and D for a more rustic horn sound fitting the text of these hunting songs. It also would have been necessary for the Waldhorn players to use ample hand technique as Schumann’s chromaticism frequently uses pitches outside the harmonic series.
Schumann chose to adapt poems from Heinrich Laube’s Jagdbrevier (Hunting Anthology), a collection of poems celebrating the permission for the German middle class to hunt, a luxury permitted previously only to the nobility.
The first song, Zur hohen Jagd (On the High Hunt), begins with a rousing hunting melody for the horns, who in turn provide rhythmic and tonal support for the chorus. The text is descriptive of the joys of hunting, and the gifts of the forest, as well as the sun, rain, and wind. The rollicking compound meter and thick articulation of the Vienna horn adds terrific heft to the voices:
The fourth song, Frühe (Early), is contrasting, marked Langsam and moving to the key of D minor. The horn parts are more intertwined and less homophonic, just as the voice parts have increased independent motion. Schumann bends the harmonies to create palpable tension, allowing the horns to sound a brief concluding chorale accentuated by a soaring high C#:
The final song in the set, Bei der Flasche (With the Bottle), is a celebration of the German hunting tradition, ending with the text, “For the hunt is in our blood!” The horns again provide support for the voices, breaking only to punctuate the piece with a final flourish:
The horns of the Vienna State Opera play with a lyrical and legato quality throughout, allowing their sound to surge forward with burnished excitement, and exuding all the best characteristics of our historic hunting horn.
Thank you, as always, for reading Horn on Record!
Student Column—New Year’s Resolutions from Quotes
by Inman Hebert
Greetings to all horn players, and happy 2025! As I pondered my New Year’s resolutions, making a horn-specific list struck me. Looking back at famous quotations that inspire me, I came up with a few key ideas that should make any horn student’s New Year’s list.
First and foremost, as horn students, we resolve to practice and commit to our instruments. Through the whirlwind of college and personal life, we can never lose sight of our desires to improve. We must commit to consistent, dedicated work on the instrument to achieve our goals. As the 16th president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln, said, “Your own resolution to success is more important than any other one thing.”
The ability to block out the distractions of everyday life and concentrate on the instrument underlies our resolve to succeed. American author Kurt Vonnegut once claimed, “The secret to success in any human endeavor is total concentration.” When we play the horn, we must be reminded to block out the outside world and give the instrument the full mental attention it necessitates.
In our ongoing quests to improve on the horn, moments of doubt, or even failure, will undoubtedly occur. Instead of being discouraged, we can ameliorate these occasions and use them as learning experiences. As the Chinese philosopher Lao-Tzu avowed, “Failure is the foundation of success, and the means by which it is achieved.” Our response to adversity can propel us to the improvement we seek.
The manner in which we approach and maintain our goals in 2025 can determine the success and productivity of the year. I encourage all students to consider their commitment to practice, their focus, and their approach to failure to help them navigate the new year.
Pedagogy—Expanding Your Horn Vocabulary
by Aliyah Danielle, IHS 57 Featured Artist
Can you imagine stopping your vocabulary growth after learning just the basics of a language? This is essentially what happens when we focus too narrowly on one style of performance. As horn players, much of our work revolves around the classical tradition, mastering works from the orchestral and solo repertoire. But today’s music industry demands more. Expanding your “horn vocabulary” means developing the stylistic and technical tools required to play any type of music authentically and with confidence. In a diverse and ever-evolving musical landscape, versatility isn’t just an asset—it’s a necessity.
Expanding your horn vocabulary opens doors to new performance opportunities and creative collaborations. It allows you to connect with a wider audience and express yourself in ways that might otherwise be limited in a classical setting. For a long time, I felt like there was a wall between the horn etudes, excerpts, solos, and ensemble music I was studying at school and the soul, gospel, funk, and R&B music that I listened to otherwise. Exploring genres outside of the classical tradition on horn has amplified my artistry in a way I never thought possible, and it has been so meaningful to see the way that my small action of stepping away from the beaten path has inspired others to do the same. This column is a crash course in what I’ll cover in my workshop at this summer’s International Horn Symposium, where we’ll dive even deeper into how you can incorporate these ideas into your own teaching and practice.
Foundations
When I was in middle school, I attended a week-long summer band camp program at the Wisconsin Conservatory of Music. In addition to private lessons, we also had chamber and large ensemble sessions, music theory, rhythm, and harmony lessons. One of my teachers there, the late percussionist Cecilio Negrón, Jr., used to always repeat the phrase: “If you can say it, you can play it.” The bottom line in achieving a solid foundation is to develop your ear. Active listening and mimicking the greats is a practical first step to developing a solid foundation, and a good handle on aural skills will make this process feel more like play and less like a chore.
Start by immersing yourself in the music you want to learn. Whether it’s pop, folk, lo-fi, or rock, create playlists, study recordings, and transcribe solos to internalize the nuances. Be sure to sing these in addition to playing them on the horn! It is also important to consider variations in tone and articulation. Different genres call for different approaches, and experimenting with tone colors and phrasing can help you adapt and become comfortable with performing what may be deemed in the classical world as “uncharacteristic sounds.” Finally, embrace improvisation. Start small, like improvising with a major scale over a drone. You can slowly expand to different scales, patterns, and chord progressions as you find a comfort zone in realizing your own ideas and breaking free from the page.
Practical Tools and Resources
There are several practical tools and resources that make this exploration more approachable. There are many method books and play-along tracks that are tailored to specific styles, and you can find many of these online for free or at a very low cost. Some resources I’ve found helpful are Blues, Bossa, Bebop, and Beyond by Steve Schaughency and Darmon Meader, 12 Jazzy Etudes for Horn by Ricardo Matosinhos, The Modern Hornist by Giovanni Hoffer, From Classical to Jazz by Joshua Pantoja, and Thesaurus of Scales and Melodic Patterns by Nicolas Slonimsky.
You can also set up a jam or practice session with people who play other instruments or specialize in other genres. In grad school, I had the privilege of taking private lessons from a saxophonist, and it is by far the most impactful experience I’ve had in developing my musicianship. Working with people proficient in other genres gives you insight into stylistic authenticity that you can’t always get from reading sheet music alone. A good place to start branching out is by listening to musical theater, film and video game or pop music, as these genres typically bridge classical and contemporary techniques. Some of my favorite composers are Quincy Jones, Natalie Holt, Terence Blanchard, Ludwig Göransson, Stephen Schwartz, Ennio Morricone, and Alan Silvestri.
An Educator’s Perspective
I’ve heard from many colleagues that they have students who would be interested in playing music outside of the classical realm, but they don’t know how to help. Integrating diverse genres into your pedagogy can prepare students for a broader range of musical experiences. Even something as simple as expanding which scales and harmonic settings your students study is a great start. Play improvisation games in your studio classes and lessons. Analyze the stylistic and theoretical elements of a piece in a different genre. Try learning new songs by ear. Being vulnerable to try new things and model flexibility yourself will give your students permission to approach new ideas with curiosity and enthusiasm. Remember that the goal is not perfection—it is to explore and discover new ways of expressing a full range of musical ideas through our instruments.
Exploring beyond the classical realm challenges us to grow as musicians and opens the door to limitless creative possibilities. I encourage you to start small—choose one new genre to explore this month and see where it takes you. We will dive even deeper into this topic at the Symposium in June, and I hope to see you there!
Themed University Horn Class Recitals
by Richard Seraphinoff, Indiana University
For the past several years, I have been organizing my horn class recitals at the IU Jacobs School of Music according to a theme or featuring a specific composer, and I wanted to share this concept with teachers everywhere simply because of the fun we have had doing it. Choosing a single composer or theme has made our class recitals into more of a project rather than a potpourri of unrelated pieces with no underlying relationships. “The Franz Strauss Project” has a nice ring to it, and the preparation for a collaborative endeavor makes everyone feel like they are equal participants in the event.
When I started looking, I was surprised how many composers had written enough music for horn that a dozen or more students could have their own individual piece or movement. So far, with a class of about a dozen horn majors, we have done concerts featuring Mozart (there are 11 concerto movements, the concert rondo, and the unfinished fragments…and to make it even more fun, we have also done them with four-horn accompaniment), Gliere (three concerto movements, four short pieces plus four more transcribed from op. 35), Alec Wilder, Franz Strauss, Antonio Rosetti, Jan Koetsier, the Otto Nicolai duets, Bernard Heiden, and Randall Faust. For this last one, Prof. Faust came as our special guest.
On November 20th this fall, our class project was the music of James Naigus with James present as our special guest. James played piano for his music, and everyone was excited about getting to perform their piece with the composer.
Aside from specific composers, we have done other themes, like pairing up horn students with IU composition students to commission a piece for each student, or performing pieces by past IU composers, or preparing a concert in which students searched out underrepresented composers for a diverse concert of works by composers who deserve more attention. A particularly enjoyable concert was one in which each student did their own transcription of a piece written for voice or for another instrument.
These recitals also give students the opportunity to say something about the piece, the composer, and any other relevant information that would be of interest to the audience. This is great practice for doing research, for collecting their thoughts to talk for a minute or so before they play, and to actually speak. It is also a good dry run for generating program notes or talking to the audience before degree recitals—in which we would like for students to connect with their audiences in addition to providing background on the compositions.
So far, we have not run out of prolific composers of horn music or themes on which to base a concert. The list of future projects is long enough to go for several years without repeating anything.
Try this idea for your next class recital. It will transform it into a memorable, even newsworthy, event.
Rick Seraphinoff, Professor of Music, Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, https://www.seraphinoff.com
