I was recently given a copy of volume 1, number 1 (February, 1971) of The Horn Call and in it there is a most interesting item on a work that proved deadly for the first horn.
Max Hess tells a most interesting story about Friedrich Gumbert [sic] and Oscar Franz:
“In the first performance of the Rhine Journey the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra’s first horn, Gumbert played it on a single F-horn. Oscar Franz had come over from Dresden where he too was a first horn player in that city’s former Court Orchestra. Dresden still felt itself superior to a civic orchestra like the Gewandhaus, and for Herr Franz to deign come into Leipzig for the performance was in itself slightly unusual.
The performance went well, and afterward Gumbert said to Franz, “Don’t worry, for your chance will come too, because no doubt Dresden will be playing this before long.” In a very short time this indeed came to pass, and Franz had to perform it. With the “setting-in” embouchure he used it must have been quite a chore. At any rate within a very few days he passed away.
One can only surmise that the physical exertion as well as the nervous strain upon the man in this particular situation may have had its effect.”
Yikes! The teller of this sad tale, Max Hess (Principal Horn in Boston and Cincinnati), was one of three prominent students of Freidrich Gumpert who emigrated to the United States and were leading players of their generation, the other two likely being a bit more familiar to modern readers, Anton Horner (Philadelphia/Curtis) and Max Pottag (Chicago/Northwestern). This article will lead you to more on their teacher Gumpert, and the portrait below is of Oscar Franz.
About Franz, I would offer this brief biography, based on materials published in The Horn Call Annual 4 (1992) and subsequently on the former Horn Articles Online website.
Oscar Franz (1843-1886–many sources give the year of his passing as 1889, which is incorrect [Damm, 5]) was one of the most prominent teachers and performers of the horn in the late nineteenth century. Franz spent most of his career in Dresden, where he taught at the Dresden Conservatory [Pizka, 134, and Morley-Pegge, 166. There is a surprising almost total lack of modern biographical information on Oscar Franz]. Franz was well respected in his time, and it is to him that Richard Strauss (1864-1949) dedicated the orchestral score of his Horn Concerto No. 1, Op. 11 (1883) [Johnson, 59. The original piano reduction, prepared by Richard Strauss, is however dedicated to his father, Franz Strauss]. Oscar Franz wrote a number of teaching materials for the horn. His Grosse theoretisch-practische Waldhorn-Schule [Complete Theoretical and Practical Horn Method] was first published around 1880. In this method Franz put forth many of his ideas for performing on the horn.
His method is very dated today, of course, but still worth checking out. Some music from it may be found in the PDF downloads of Horn Matters. Finally, I recorded (on a single F horn in the style of his time) one of his musical works! Give it a listen.
