G unther Schuller once observed, "Everybody seems to know that the horn is reputed to be a devilishly difficult instrument; and even the layman, upon hearing some out-of-place 'blurp' or 'cracked' note, knows to look first at the horn section to find the culprit" (Schuller, Horn Tech- nique, Oxford University Press, 1976). Many high school band and orchestra directors would agree that the horn is one of the most difficult instruments to teach. Horn players need to have very strong aural skills, and they have to learn "horn specif- ic" techniques such as muting, stop- ping, transposition, lip trills, alter- nate fingerings, hand positions, and bell position. ONE OF THE BIG CHALLENGES FOR horn players is knowing where to properly place the right hand in the bell of the instrument. Many ele- mentary players place the palm of the hand against the inside of the bell or hold the outside of the bell to help support the instrument. As they proceed through middle and high school, horn players are usually given many different suggestions for prop- er placement of the right hand. In an effort to change from a "palm against the bell" placement to a proper placement, many students put too much of their hand in the bell. This results in a fuzzy, covered, and out- Figure 1. Correct hand placement in the bell of the horn N o t e : V iew ed f r o m abov e, the back of the f ingers should be flat against the f ar side of the bell. of-tune sound. In The Art of French Horn Playing (Summy-Birchard Music, 1956), Philip Farkas recom- mends three steps to proper right- hand placement (see figure 1 for an illustration of this position): 1. Hold the right hand flat with the fingers held together so that absolutely no space occurs between them. Pay particular attention to the thumb, which should lie along the edge of the hand, and in the same plane as the fingers. Cup the hand slightly. 2. Now hold the hand in a verti- cal plane with the little finger nearest the ground and the thumb upper- most. 3. Insert this slightly cupped hand in the horn bell so that only the backs of the fingers and the top of the thumb touch the metal. The hand will be against the side of the bell farthest from the body. (Parkas, pp. 12-13) A SIMPLE REMINDER TO STUDENTS to be conscious of the right hand will often help improve the sound of the section. Another issue affecting the right hand is the clothing of the player. A heavy sweater or suit jacket can greatly affect the tone and pitch of the horn. Tuning with a sweater sleeve rolled up and playing twenty minutes later after the sleeve has fall- en down may account for intonation problems in the horn section. Very often in late romantic music,! the composer will write "bells up" on j the score of the horn part. Although it is fun to play with the bells up in the air, it is not recommended with a \h school horn section. The embouchure control that is required to truly play "bells up" is not often present in high school players. Even in many professional orchestras, horn sections routinely ignore the "bells up" markings. 34 T E A C H I N G U S I Ci K H E G E N E R A L L Y A CCE PTE D R U L E OF nb is that double horn fingerings C used for notes above g (a fifth ; middle C) and below g (a fourth rmiddle C). Single horn finger- i are used for g and g and die notes I between. I f some of the players are ying on single horns while others are )ang on double horns, there will be onation challenges that are almost Bpossible to deal with. There are s when alternate fingerings on the j buble horn may be desirable, for nee, to create a more logical finger i in a fast passage. See figure 2 t suggested alternate fingerings. is's book is a good reference for ate fingerings. For more general brmation on die horn, see David bouses Practical Hints on Playing the Horn [Belwin-Mills, 1983] and Barry Tuckwell's Horn [Schirmer Books, 1983].) I t is often difficult for horn players to decipher the mute markings in the score. Words found in musical scores that refer to "with mute" or "muted" include: mitDampfer (G erman) gedampft (G erman) avec sourdine (French) con sordino (I talian). When composers ask for a mute, they intend the use of a conical shaped nontransposing mute of cardboard, metal, or wood, with cork strips to reg- ulate the amount of stoppage. The pitch of a mute can be altered by short- ening or lengthening the piece of cylin- drical tubing that is inside the mute. H owever, most school-owned mutes (the red and white stone-lined mutes made by H umes and Berg) do not have this inside tubing. Students must use their ears and embouchures to keep muted notes in tune. Stopping the bell with the hand while playing with good intonation is almost always a challenge for a high school horn section. Mark- ings in the score that refer to hand stopping include: gestopft (G erman) boucht (French) chiuso (I talian) "+" (placed above the note). H orn players must always transpose down (not up) a half-step when playing stopped notes. I n addition, they should continued on page 48 ju r e 2 . F i n g e r i n g C h a r t ended y. . . - o T ^5 _j ; f t t r t 0 IW 1-2-3 1-3 t f l y& 2-3 1 jg 1-2 O . i fr o P^ 1 G 2 6 0 -.|0 lag T-2-3 -f c,f cg ,5 T-1-2 Q 30 W T-1 S 0 >o n on e available none available none available n on e available n on e available T-1-2-3 T-1-3 1-2-3 1-3 T-3 2-3 _^! 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Provides exemplary strategies to enable teachers of methods courses to introduce their students to the competen- cies and skills called for in the K-12 N ational Music Standards. A vital connection between the preparation of music teachers and the practice of music educa- tion. C ompiled and edited by Louis O. H all with N ancy R. Boone, John G rashel, and Rosemary C . Watkins. 1997. I SBN 1-56545-093-0. #1656. $25.00/$20.00 MENC members To order, me the MENC Resources order fa rm on pa ge 56! C ontinued from pa ge 35 always play the stopped note on the F side of the double horn. I t is impor- tant when stopping the horn to try to completely cut off the air with the hand. I f the students are having trou- ble with a stopped horn, the use of a brass stopped mute is recommended. A hhough the brass stopped mute is more expensive (about $70), the advantage is that intonation will be more accurate. When using a brass stopped mute, the student must still use a half-step transposition. VV H E N WRI T I N G A T RA N SPOSE D part for horn in bass clef, composers often notate an octave lower tJian is actually played. A nontransposed part in this "old" notation will include bass clef notes written a fourth below sounding pitch. A lthough "new" nota- tion includes transposed parts written as played and nontransposed parts written a fifth above sounding pitch, many modern composers still use old notation for the horns. A general rule to follow for high school horn players is that if the part seems unreasonably low, it's probably written in old nota- tion and the student should play the part in the more comfortable range. T here are two kinds of trills used on the horn. I f the written trill calls for a half-step motion, the trill is done with the valves. A whole-step trill is to be performed with die lip. A lthough lip trills are difficult to perform well, the use of the valves on a whole step trill never results in the desired sound. Students should be encouraged to work on the lip trill. Sometimes problems in the horn section sound may be caused by poor embouchure positions of individual players. A poor embouchure may cause intonation and range problems in addition to generally poor tone quality. H owever, it is often difficult in a large group setting to work on individual embouchures. A lso, at the high school level, most students have been playing with a particular embouchure for several years, and it is hard for them to change. Farkas suggests that the setting of the mouthpiece on the lips generally should result in a proportion of "2/3 upper lip and 1/3 lower lip on the mouthpiece" ( The Art of French Horn Pl a ying, p. 21). I f a student in the high school program plays with an embouchure that does not fit this mold and appears to be having into- nation, range, or tone quality prob- lems, the director should encourage that student to seek professional help from a horn player to rework the embouchure. Much of the traditional band and orchestra literature includes horn parts in which the entire section heads up to high B-flat or high C . T hese notes are extremely difficult for an entire section to play at the same time. Upper-register notes require three elements and if any one is missing, the player will be unsuccessful. First, the player must hear the high pitch he or she is try- ing to play. A , good way to prepare horn players is to have them sing their part as much as possible. I ndi- vidual students should practice singing alone as well. Second, stu- dents must support the upper note with lots of air. T hird, the concen- tration level must be solid. I n gener- al, the conductor needs to work with the horn players in a positive, supportive way. B y C o l l e e n C o n w a y , a s s i s t a n t p r o f e s s o r o f m u s ic e d u c a t i o n a t R u t g e r s U n i v e r s i t y , N e w B r u n s w i c k , N e w J e r s e y . 48 T E A C H I N G M U S I C
Universal Method For The Saxophone - Based Upon The Celebrated Works Of A. Mayeur, H. Klose And Others, And Containing The Complete Fingerings For The Latest Improved Saxophones
How to Study Fiorillo: A detailed, descriptive analysis of how to practice these studies, based upon the best teachings of representative, modern violin playing