Opera Playing in Japan
by Eiko Taba, horn player, Tokyo Philharmonic
Aside from our performances on stage in the concert hall, 2/3 of the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra's schedule each year consists of opera and ballet programs. These performances take place in Hatsudai, Tokyo at the New National Theatre (Opera Palace), which is Japan's first permanent opera theater. Below is a description of how opera rehearsals, which are different from our regular concert rehearsals, are structured.
A new opera production will take about 10 days worth of rehearsals. While we usually only rehearse 2-3 days for a regular orchestra concert (often times we'll only rehearse 1 day), with opera there are many other components that need to be practiced. There is a lot of time spent working on balance and timing with the singers, adjusting the lighting, making sure set changes happen smoothly, and checking the timing and balance of the "Banda" (off-stage musicians).
Our opera repertoire is vast, from Mozart to contemporary music, and therefore we sometimes have to change not only the horn section seating alignment, but also where we sit in the pit (if it's a regular concert on stage we never change where we sit, unless we're asked to move by the conductor). Within the horn section no one usually requests to change the seating alignment, except for when the timpani is very close. If it is someone will likely say "hey the vibrations from the timpani are going into my bell, please move over a little bit!" *Fortunately for us, no one has ever said "I hate the horn bell being so close, move over!"
When looking into the pit from the audience, it seems very narrow and as if we are really crammed in. But from the players side it doesn't feel that way. Actually inside the pit we can hear the singer's voices very well. It mixes right in with the orchestra and gives us a great feeling while we are performing.
This season's opening act is "Walküre" from Wagner's ring cycle. We have an amazing lineup of singers this time (they are amazing every time!!!). Of course there are 8 horns (4 of which also play Wagner tuba), so there are many great parts to listen to in the piece. Especially in "Ride of the Valkyries", at the beginning of Act 3, the horn section, the stage performance, and of course the singers!! It's so powerful that I get goose bumps every time. It's going to be a great season opener, so for those of you who have time please come to our concert!
With permission from: New National Theatre
Translation: Jonathan Hammil
Opera Playing in Japan
東京フィルハーモニー交響楽団ホルン奏者
田場英子
私達、東京フィルハーモニー交響楽団は、コンサートホールなどでの公演の他に、初台にある、日本初の常設オペラ劇場「新国立劇場(オペラパレス)」にて、年間の2/3にあたるオペラ・バレエの公演を行います。その中でオペラ公演のリハーサルは、通常のコンサートと違い、以下の様なスケジュールで行います。
新演出の公演の場合は、リハーサルだけで10日間弱行われます。
通常のオーケストラのリハーサルは2～3日、もしくは1日のみの事が多いのですが、オペラは歌手とのバランス、タイミング、照明、舞台装置、「バンダ」と呼ばれるバックステージでの演奏とのタイミングやバランスなど、沢山の事柄を本番に備え調整していきます。
Meet Your Makers – Richard Seraphinoff, Historical Horn Maker
I thrive on variety. I teach modern horn, early horn, and brass literature and history at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music, play horn, make horns, do research into horn design, construction and history, and write about the horn. “But wait a minute!” the astute reader will say, “That’s not variety. That’s all about horn!” Well - OK, it is all about the horn, but as we all know, there’s a lot of variety under the subject of horn. Teaching is about working one on one and in classes with our talented IU horn players, helping them to develop their skills and move toward their goals. Playing is sharing music with the people who you are playing for, and the people you are playing with. Writing and researching are the academic side of things, and not done in real time with real people, but rather alone and at a leisurely pace, and often involve interesting travel. Horn making is just me and the metal, but I’m still working with people, making something that will be a tool that will make their work easier and more enjoyable. Over the past nearly forty years, each one of these things has been an antidote to all of the others, and whether I am sitting on a stage, teaching horn at IU, sitting at my computer, or in my workshop, I always have the pleasant feeling of “I like this part best!”
But when Jeff Nelsen and Kristina Mascher-Turner asked me to write this, they were specifically interested in the instrument maker side of me, sometimes known as my second full-time job. I started making reproductions of historical horns because I needed appropriate horns when I began seriously playing with period instrument groups in the 1970s. At that point the choices were either expensive antique horns or a few rather modern valveless horns that were being made. But fortunately I came from a family that made things. My father made airplanes as a hobby, - real airplanes in which we flew, and I grew up thinking that if you needed something, you just had to learn out how it was made, get the right materials and tools, and then go ahead and make it.
Interview of the Month: Anneke Scott
Certainly one of the foremost natural horn players of our time is English virtuoso Anneke Scott. She records and tours extensively as a soloist and as principal horn with the finest period ensembles around the world, including the English Baroque Soloists, Europa Galante, The Kings Consort, and Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique, among others. She is also a dedicated scholar and proponent of historically informed performance. Ms. Scott currently teaches at the The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and the University of Birmingham. Read this interview, and I promise you’ll come away educated, with fresh ideas on how to approach our beloved repertoire, whether valved or valveless. Thank you, Anneke! - KMT
Kristina Mascher-Turner: What was it that sparked your fascination with the natural horn in the first place?
Anneke Scott: I was first introduced to the instrument a few months before I did my music college undergrad auditions, so I was about 17 at the time. My teacher was honing his skills as an instrument repairer and had picked up some battered old piston horns and turned them into natural horns. He lent me one as he thought it might interest me - I was immediately hooked. What initially appealed was the challenge. I had to work it out more or less on my own, and I remember the frustration of becoming a beginner once more on pieces I thought I knew. When I went to music college (Royal Academy of Music, London) I started to meet other brass students who were getting interested in period instruments; plus we had John Wallace as head of department who did much to encourage us. The period instrument scene is very active in London, so all this made me want to focus on this aspect of playing in my career.
KMT: You studied the hand horn in three countries: the UK, France, and the Netherlands. Can you tell us something about the different traditions and approaches to the instrument you encountered in each one?
AS: I think there was definitely a different approach to teaching in the three institutions, and, though I'm not sure whether these approaches reflect a wider national tradition, I suspect my memories are also strongly influenced by the stages I was at in different places. The RAM had a rather gung-ho approach to period instruments. We were all encouraged to learn "auxiliary" instruments (period instruments such as natural trumpet, natural horn, sackbut, cornetto, serpent, ophicleide, or the additional modern instruments such as piccolo trumpet, flugelhorn, Wagner tuba, euphonium etc.) For a lot of people a basic idea of these instruments was sufficient, which in a way made it easy to feel that one was an expert while in essence still a beginner. One thing that I feel was incredibly important from my time studying at the RAM was that I was never told anything was difficult. I do remember, on having said yes to a student Bach cantata gig, my natural horn teacher (Andrew Clark) carefully saying I might like to take a closer look before saying yes in future (the cantata in question was screamingly high.) But it's something I certainly appreciate from Andrew’s teaching - he never said anything was difficult, and therefore I never developed a complex about what I was doing. Everything was approachable.
My studies in France and the UK overlapped somewhat. The RAM was superb about letting me slot in my studies in France. Claude Maury remains to this day probably my greatest influence; I don't believe I'd be doing what I do today without his continued generous mentorship. He had taken me under his wing when I first started going to France to play with the period youth orchestra, Jeune Orchestre Atlantique, and was very insistent that if I was to study in France I had to get to grips with the wide range of 18th/19th century methods we have from that country. This really helped me to improve. The one abiding memory I have of studying with Claude, though, is his insistence that we must never use the instrument as an excuse. We shouldn't shrug and explain away a fluffed passage with the argument that the notes are tricky/out of tune on the natural horn. Claude instilled in me the belief that these instruments aren't flawed and that it's our job to ensure the audience hears music rather than someone failing to surmount technical challenges. It was also Claude who introduced me to Gallay. It was a huge pleasure when, several years after I studied the Caprices with Claude, he agreed to produce the first two Gallay albums I recorded for Resonus Classics.
Finally, I studied in Amsterdam with Teunis van der Zwart. There were two reasons I wanted to study with Teunis: he is an amazingly accurate player (and that was something on which I wanted to focus), but also there is a big difference between the approach to baroque horn playing taken by British players and our continental colleagues. I felt it would be beneficial to spend some time studying Baroque horn in particular with him. The Dutch period performance departments are very hard-core; they're not for students who aren't totally committed. Luckily I had a Dutch grandmother so I had a bit of an idea about the brusqueness I would encounter in Holland (!) The main thing I took away from my studies in Holland was that it wasn't enough to be competent; it wasn't enough to play all the notes in tune and with a good tone; you had to play with rhetoric, with phrasing and with conviction.
KMT: What instruments do you own, and which of them is the oldest?
AS: The oldest instrument I have is a beautiful Lucien-Joseph Raoux cor solo from around 1800.
Ok, I'm embarrassed to admit I've lost count, but shall I hazard a roll call?
Baroque horns:
- "Revised" copy of Michael Leichnambschneider c. 1720s by John Webb/Antony Halstead
- Hoffmaster (Edinburgh collection, c. 1760s) copy by Richard Seraphinoff
Natural horns:
- Lausmann c. 1790s copy by Andreas Jungwirth
- Lucien-Joseph Raoux cor solo c. 1800
- Marcel-Auguste Raoux cor d'orchestre c. 1820
- Stohr c. 1820s copy by Lowell Greer
- Sauterelle horns (horns with detachable valve blocks):
- Marcel-Auguste Raoux (1860s) with Boosey valve block (1910s)
- Mahillion
Piston horns (most with crooks)
- Boosey, Hawkes, Boosey & Hawkes, Raoux, Selmer.
- Rotary horn (with either crooks or fixed lead pipe)
- Uhlmann, Kruspe, Bopp, Bohland und Fuchs, couple of others I can't remember.
Misc:
- 19th century Péllison trompe de chasse
- Lidl Walzenhorn
- Jungwirth Vienna horn
- MANY 19th century tenor saxhorns (due to work with a group called The Prince Regents Band - one day I'll find one I'm happy with).
- Also my old 1960s Alex 103.
I'm sure there are instruments I've forgotten, but that gives you an idea of the scope.
KMT: Do you feel that a truly authentic historical performance of a work requires original instruments? How can a modern, valve horn player best recreate the intention of the composer when the work was originally written for natural horn?
AS: "Authentic" is a very difficult word; in many ways the period instrument movement has moved away from it, as it's so loaded. There used to be a lot of claims (mostly from labels and promoters perhaps?) about a group/recording/performance being the "most authentic performance yet" and, rightly, this has gone out of fashion. We'll never be able to be "authentic" as we see everything through the prism of our own time. Similarly, audiences come to performances with the sensibilities our own time.
A lot of people talk about "Historically Informed Performance" now, which opens up many possibilities. A performance on modern instruments can be "historically informed" - taking on board aspects of style, phrasing, tempi etc.
For me, one of the really attractive things about the natural horn is the wide range of colours available - not just in terms of the open/stopped notes, but also in terms of the particular colours and characteristics of the crooks. I'm not such a fan of people incorporating the stopped notes on the modern horn, but I would encourage people to explore how they can reflect the timbre of the different crooks - starting by using fingerings that bring you closer to the relevant crook - so try playing the Beethoven Sonata as much as possible on the open F side, or a Mozart concerto using the first valve on the F side.
But for me if there is one thing that would bring a modern, valve horn player, closer to the composers’ intentions, it would be finding out more about rhetoric. This underpins all music up until at least the mid 19th century. Everyone studied rhetoric, and it was an incredibly important element of the arsenal that made up an expressive musician. Rhetoric is the art of swaying an audience, of making them feel certain emotions, of taking them by the hand and leading them through a story in which they feel totally engaged.
Anyone who has studied sonata form will already have been introduced to rhetoric. If you were going to give a speech or write an essay you might be encouraged to use a form something like this:
- Introduction - set the scene and lay out the basic tenants of your argument/ideas
- Discussion/Defense - explore the arguments/ideas
- Summary - conclusion in which you reiterate things so that the audience goes away with the main points clearly in mind.
Compare this to sonata form:
- Exposition - set the scene and lay out the main themes
- Development - explore the main themes
- Recapitulation - conclusion in which you reiterate the main themes.
For anyone eager to learn more, the best place to start would be "Early Music is Dead" by Bruce Haynes or "The Weapons of Rhetoric" by Judy Tarling. Bruce Haynes, an amazingly influential musician, died whilst working on another book on rhetoric called "The Pathetick Musician" but, happily, this has been completed by his colleague Geoffrey Burgess. This is a recent publication and is also highly recommended.
KMT: Thorough research is crucial to accurate historical performance. How do you approach a work and bring it to life?
AS: There are various directions "in" to any piece. A lot of the time, my initial approach is dependent upon which is the easiest first approach! So, I might first source an appropriate instrument. Sometimes this is easy (Gallay on a Raoux cor solo), sometimes more complex (Haydn/Mozart for example - we tend to use instruments which are far too late for this repertoire. It's more common to see early 19th French instruments being used rather that mid/late 18th century German instruments, partially having to do with accessibility). Another way "in" is the "text" - the music in front of us. An important lesson to learn is that something is not necessarily trustworthy just because it's in print. Similarly it's important to learn that "Urtext" is not necessarily much better. It's quite a challenge making a modern edition of a piece - often there are discrepancies between and within sources, and editors often have to make an informed decision. This means frequently you're reading an interpretation, probably a very good one, but an interpretation nonetheless. This is why it can be very valuable to track down sources, to see what is actually there and make your own interpretation.
There are dozen of other things we can look at. Google Books is great for finding newspaper reviews of performances. We've also got a great history of methods and treatises to explore. For certain things, early recordings can throw up some very exciting new ideas.
I've been recently working on the Donald Tovey Trio for clarinet, horn and piano, and it's been a good case study for a lot of these elements. We know that Borsforf premiered this piece, so I've been trying out various piston horns from the period (including Borsdorf’s own.) My next step is to look a bit into the style of mouthpiece he was using (different from what most British players were using at the time). We've got a lot of information about the compositional process because Tovey wrote extensively on the piece. We've got reviews of this performance plus reviews of other performances by the individual performers of the period; plus, whilst we don't have a recording of the Trio, we do have many recordings of the musicians of the period performing other pieces that give us the opportunity to explore more about the style and techniques that they were using.
One book that I think every horn player, both modern and period, should have on their bookshelves is John Humphries "The Early Horn." In it Humphries includes a selection of case studies on pieces such as the "Quoniam" from the Bach Mass in B minor, the Joseph Haydn Concerto in D (Hob VIId:3) and the concerto attributed to Haydn (Hob VIId:4) Mozart KV495, the Beethoven Sonata Op. 17, Schubert Auf dem Strom, Schumann Adagio und Allegro, and Brahms Horn Trio Op. 40. These are perfect examples of bringing together various historical and organological sources to inform performance, and his sections on style and technique are a great place to start for any performer.
KMT: Do you find it a challenge to switch back and forth between hand horn and the modern horn? Is there a transition period of “making friends” with one when you’ve been performing on the other, or can you carry on with both simultaneously?
AS: There is no "normal" so changing instruments isn't too hard. What is slightly time consuming is "set up" time. There is the necessary maintenance of course, but often I have to make sure an instrument is happy working at a particular pitch. We get everything from A392 to A452, and recently I seem to have had a lot of unusual requests requiring an afternoon sitting down with bits of plumbing and finding solutions.
I normally tweak my choice of mouthpiece depending on the instrument and repertoire, so this is often a consideration in the preparation period. In a way changing mouthpieces is a bonus - I always try to focus on whatever I'm playing at the time and not to think of what I was playing yesterday or will be playing tomorrow. "Don't look down!" If I have a different mouthpiece, it helps me not to be lulled into the memory of what has just been.
Flexibility is a really important quality for musicians to have. Changing instruments isn't easy, but I suspect it's a bit like that old line about foreign languages, that there is a point where you're fluent in so many that adding another isn't much of a challenge. It certainly takes some getting used to, and you really have to pay attention and be super critical of what you're doing.
KMT: Your travel schedule is impressive. Do you have any secrets or hacks for coping with your time on the road?
AS: Ha! Yep. I think a lot of musicians reckon they could have a thriving career as a travel agent should the whim take them to change jobs!
Things that help - travel as light as possible but plan accordingly. I have an abiding hatred of (1) items that have come on tour and served no purpose and (2) having to buy something on tour, of which I have many at home!
I have an iPad with ForScore on it and a huge library of sheet music (Goodreader is a useful app for this) and audio as well as Bluetooth pedals to turn pages. This saves me having to take scores/sheet music etc. with me, a huge bonus. I always have a playlist called "Forthcoming" into which I pop a selection of recordings of repertoire coming up in the following months so will often use down time to listen to this.
For getting around www.rome2rio.com is brilliant - especially when something goes wrong! It gives alternatives for getting from A to B, so if the direct flight is cancelled you may well find that the next speediest choice is counterintuitive - taking a bus to a train station which will take you to another airport which flies to the next city from where you need to be. Similarly www.skyscanner.com is great for playing around with variables of travel.
I must admit one thing that makes a HUGE difference is my membership of something called the Priority Pass. This is a subscription that gets me into lounges in airports around the world. It means that there is somewhere quiet I can work or relax whilst waiting for a flight. Normally there's food and drink (great when you're flying out of a country that you haven't been performing in and therefore don't have the local currency!) and wifi. Often it's a lot calmer there than elsewhere in an airport so you arrive less frazzled!
The main thing I would say about travelling is to try and build in time for things that go wrong. Often that's not an option due to schedules, but I'm certainly one of those people who like to be early (the lounges are a great incentive for that!)
KMT: What relevance does the natural horn have in modern repertoire? What would you say to a composer to convince them to write for hand horn today?
AS: There is a great deal of overlap between the period performance and contemporary music worlds. I think practitioners in both camps have a lot of things in common, and I can think of a number of musicians who have careers in both. For both you have a lot of "extra" things to learn - notation, techniques, new styles, tuning systems etc.
A number of composers have written new compositions for the instrument. For me one of the best examples is still the orchestral writing in the Ligeti concerto. I also find the repertoire commissioned by Baumann for his competitions in the 1980s/90s fascinating.
In recent years quite a few composers have been commissioned to write for period orchestras. This is a huge generalisation, but by and large what I've heard hasn't really impressed me. If I may generalise some more, I've noticed a tendency for composers to play with the baroque/classical forms and structures but not really get to grips with the workings of the instruments and the colours that they have. If I may be a touch cynical I would say it is understandable that a composer may wish their work to have longevity and therefore it makes sense to create a piece that could work equally on period and modern instruments in the future, rather than limiting it to a period band.
I'm married to a composer (John Croft) and so have a bit of experience-by-proxy. John has written for me before (https://soundcloud.com/johncroft/une-autre-voix-qui-chante.) Initially I was cautious about playing this piece as it felt like I was entering another world. I think the reason I feel "Une autre voix qui chante" works is that John understands both how the instrument works and the colours that are available; also he's influenced by spectral music, a style that taps into a lot of things intrinsic in any natural instrument. John, unbeknownst to me, was working on this composition around the time I was recording the Gallay Caprices (the title of the work comes from a line in Gallay's Methode) so he had plenty of exposure to the instrument!
If a composer were interested in writing for the natural horn, my first suggestion would be to read part 3 of Dauprat's method - this is written with composers in mind and really explores what is possible. Then I would suggest they spend some time with a natural horn player and explore timbre and articulation. So much is possible on the instrument!
KMT: When you put your horns away, what other interests fuel you?
AS: I think my life really revolves around music! There is so much I want to do that it’s unusual to find me doing anything else. Yes, I keep fit (running and yoga mainly) but that is mainly because it benefits my playing and my ability to cope with the lifestyle more than anything else.
I listen to a lot of music and am constantly trying to listen to "new things". This is one thing I find great about social media - if I see anything recommended I'll get hold of it (I think I'm single-handedly keeping the CD market afloat - I also love reading sleeve notes so Spotify et al isn't for me). Downtime at home normally means good food and wine, music and long conversations with my husband.
I read a tremendous amount, again mostly to do with music, or tangential to music. I do tend to try and read fiction from the period/geographical region of things I'm working on. For instance, I've been doing a lot of early Victorian repertoire recently so got back into Walter Scott who was hugely popular at that point in time.
You can check out Anneke’s natural horn prowess on the following YouTube clips:
Intro to the natural horn
Into to the sauterelle horn
Bach Quoniam (45 mins in)
Gallay caprices
Gallay opera fantasias
Wagner
Parforce Ensemble
You haven’t lived until you’ve experienced a Parforce horn troupe up close! This ensemble from St. Hubert, Belgium, performing the Messe de St. Hubert, keeps alive a centuries-old tradition. Be sure to turn up the volume for the full effect of the natural horn’s boisterous cousin.
Timbre and Taste
by Jeffrey Snedeker
As many of you also know, the natural horn has been an important part of my musical life and career, beginning with sharing First Place in the Natural Horn Division (with Javier Bonet) of the American Horn Competition (now the International Horn Competition of America) almost 25 years ago. The pursuit of this instrument has had an interesting effect on the following:
- my performing in general, including an influence on technique and musical decisions;
- my teaching, which has adjusted to include student experiences with the instrument;
- my recital repertoire, ranging from the earliest Baroque pieces to new pieces for the instrument
- my concept of the aesthetic of pieces that call for the instrument, historical or contemporary;
This last item, my concept of the aesthetic of the pieces that include the instrument, is the one that has been on my mind recently, especially after hearing a range of live and recorded performances that provoke a question: when composers wrote notes that require some sort of hand-stopping, what should those notes sound like?
The approach to stopped timbres has two obvious extremes, both of which we hear in public and on recordings. One is to bring the volume of the stopped notes up to that of the open notes in a passage, most frequently creating a raspy timbre like a “modern” stopped sound. The second is to do the opposite, to modify the volume of open notes that the timbre is more even and the changes are subtler. The 18th- and 19th-century methods that comment on timbre generally encourage the second way, yet many modern performers, for whatever reasons, seem to choose the first way.
Natural Horn Playing Now and Forty Years Ago
by Ab Koster
When I started playing the natural horn in 1970, musicians who played original instruments were extremely rare. In Vienna in the late 1950’s, Nikolaus Harnoncourt founded his group called “Concentus Musicus Wien.” They started with only strings, and he conducted the group from his cello chair. Harnoncourt had close contact with some Dutch musicians – Gustav Leonhardt, Frans Brüggen, and Anner Bijlsma. Frans Brüggen and Anner Bijlsma were teaching at the Koninklijk Conservatorium in The Hague, where I studied.
Together with Frans Vester, the flute player of the famous Danzi Woodwind Quintet, they inspired me to start playing on the natural horn. At the same time, I won a Dutch prize (“Prix d’Excellence”) that gave me the opportunity to make several recordings for Dutch radio. I was so inspired by the idea of playing natural horn that I proposed, after recording the Schumann Adagio and Allegro and the Dukas Villanelle, to play the Beethoven Sonata on natural horn next time. The only problem was that I had no instrument.
I started to study with Hermann Baumann in 1971 for the “Konzertexamen” in Essen, and he advised me to order a copy made by Meinl and Lauber in Geretsried near Munich. At the same time, I started to practice natural horn on my single Bb Alexander, which had an F crook at the thumb valve for the low notes. (Almost everybody played a single Bb horn back then in Holland, just as Dennis Brain, Peter Damm, and Alan Civil did in those days.)
Just in time before the recording, I received my Meinl and Lauber copy. It was a copy of a Huschauer, a Baroque instrument with a rather large bell. My colleagues in the Residentie Orchestra (my first full-time position) started laughing when they saw me with that natural horn. Everyone thought it was just a nice attempt that would end soon.