Sometimes I think of batteries when I think about endurance on the horn. Batteries run down with use, and as they deplete the energy level produced is less and less. Similarly, there are only so many notes you can get your chops to produce before they run out of juice. We all know the feeling.
Building chops for endurance
As I’ve done now several times in this series, I’ll start with a story to illustrate the topic.
I started taking professional auditions in earnest after finishing my MM, and made finals for several jobs. Which was great, but I was not winning a job. One of my personal conclusions was I felt my chops were running out of gas in the finals.
I went back to school to work on my Doctorate at IU, and my first semester there I did my second major embouchure change (having also changed my embouchure as an undergrad). This time, my goal was to get the mouthpiece a bit higher so that it was better supported by the skin above my upper lip, rather than resting only on my fairly heavy upper lip. It was with that embouchure setting that I eventually won the Third Horn position in Nashville.
Fast forward, in Nashville I still felt my endurance could be better, and I stared doing some Caruso studies. It was like “weight lifting” for my chops, and it was helpful. I had some strong chops going.
Fast forward a few more years, and I’m teaching at Arizona State. I’m still feeling OK about my endurance and chops, but then I made a trip back to Bloomington and my teacher, Mike Hatfield, had photos of my IU embouchure that had been taken by Farkas in one of my very few lessons with him. I was kind of shocked, my embouchure had slipped lower over many years to between embouchure #2 and #3 (the IU change being #3). I briefly tried to change it further, back to the #3 embouchure in the photo, and realized that was just a terrible idea and left things as they were. To this day I still play on embouchure #2.5.
There are things you can change
Which is all to say, you can alter several things with a goal of building endurance. Mouthpiece placement and equipment choices can be part of it, but also how you train your lips and how smart you are about how you manage your playing from day to day.
Ease of production at all levels of fatigue, or, playing smarter not harder
Returning to the prompt from the Hill book (this series is based on a list of fundamentals from Hill), playing mostly third horn for a number of years is a taxing thing. I leaned on maintaining healthy routines and I knew the value of rest and pacing.
Pro players think in terms of the number of services per day or per week. You will never have more than two services a day in a full-time playing position, and there are days off built into the schedule. But sometimes, especially in the busy time before Christmas, you will have a number of three service days to contend with. It can be done, but you really have to plan and be careful with your chops.
One bottom line being that there are only so many notes you can play in a day, and you need to be fresh enough to play the important ones well. Plan ahead. Be smart. If it hurts, you have pushed things too far, and will need some recovery time. Build lighter days into your schedule, and take a day off sometimes.
But sometimes there is no way around being tired at the end of a long concert. I recall one series in Nashville in particular, the final work was Brahms 3. If you know the third horn part, on the final chords you are holding an E on the top space for ages. I remember so vividly the thought I had playing it — “I’m not falling off the last note!!” I was using extra pressure and willpower to hold it up. Fortunately, I never fell off it, having paced myself carefully enough during the week.
An assistant can really help
Related, I’ve also played plenty of first horn, and an assistant is so helpful.
If you are not very up on the topic, I have a print article on the topic, published in The Horn Call 34, no. 2 (February, 2004). Be sure to talk with your teachers and observe other players, but the following excerpt gives some basic guidelines most would agree with.
In general there are four types of passages that I look to give to the assistant horn when I am playing principal horn:
- Passages closely aligned with the trumpets. This is especially common in Classical literature where the first horn and first trumpet are in octaves.
- Passages where the first and third horns are doubled. Unison tutti passages are great places to lay off on first for a moment or longer.
- Passages before major solos. The classic example is the end of movement one of Tchaikovsky, Symphony No. 5, where the first horn should rest for most of the page before movement two. Even for less extended solos I personally find it of great help to insert even a very short rest before exposed passages.
- “Footballs,” long strings of whole notes (or similar) when not overly exposed. Some “pass offs” from the first horn to the assistant can be of great help.
In all of these situations it is essential for the principal and assistant to match in terms of volume and general style. It is also very important for the principal horn to have a clear sense of where the first part is doubled down the section.
In short, if you don’t use the assistant effectively you are setting yourself up for potential failure. They are a very important member of the section and of great value to you if you are principal horn.
For a more specific example, I shared this musical example and text in my Playing High Horn book as well.
While assistant horn markings will always be very individualized, the following is an example of the opening page of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 with assistant markings. Try the first horn passages with and without the assistant; the passages covered by the assistant horn will certainly give the principal horn more freedom to play the conclusion of this work with greater abandon and better accuracy.
When the series of fundamentals continues the topic is concentration.
Continue reading the Fundamentals series
