Horn Matters | A French Horn and Brass Site and Resource | John Ericson and Bruce Hembd

The years between 1814 and 1850 saw the introduction of the valved horn into music and many changes in horn technique, especially in the areas of the use of crooks, right-hand technique, transposition, and valves.

A general note for readers. As originally conceived, this article was much shorter and primarily linked to a series of pages on the former Horn Articles Online website. With that site going dark in 2025, this was expanded to provide the same general overview, but with any links staying within Horn Matters. As you read into it you will see the writing tone shift multiple times, as the content is based on different source materials that were written over a number of years. Much of this content is unique, and is presented here with the goal of providing a broad overview of the topic for my students and all interested in horn history.

People were looking for solutions to the “natural horn problem”

The simple fact was the natural horn could not play chromatically into the lower range and did not have an even tone color. It worked the best on simple diatonic passages that were mostly open harmonics.

This fact led to many experiments. As I wrote in an article published in the Historic Brass Society Journal 9 (1997),

One of the most interesting experiments is documented in an 1812 article in Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung, “Wichtige Verbesserung des Horns” [Important Improvement to the Horn], by composer and theorist Gottfried Weber (1779-1839). Christian Dikhuth, a hornist in the court orchestra in Mannheim, had applied a short trombone slide with a return spring to the horn, a feat which he had accomplished by 1811. The invention operated on the same principal as the English slide trumpet, which dates from the end of the eighteenth century [Tarr, vol. 3, 404]. The slide could be used to lower the pitch of the instrument by a half step and was pulled into an extended position by means of a clock spring mechanism unless held in by the performer; the slide was normally held in. No example of this design is known to have survived, but based on the published description, the instrument could be illustrated as below.

Weber’s review showed how this mechanism could be used not only to correct intonation, but also to produce a number of new pitches without stopping the bell with the hand. Other notes, previously available only by heavily stopping the bell, could now be produced by using the hands in conjunction, the left thumb operating the mechanism by means of a cord attached to the slide and the right hand lightly stopping the bell. While not making the horn fully chromatic, it was now possible to use much less coverage with the right hand and thus obtain a much more even tonal color.

The article goes on to show how the new device can be used to great advantage in the last movement of Beethoven 3.

Another “big idea” that did not catch on was the keyed horn. About those I wrote,

Several contemporary artists also tried to apply keys to the horn. Following up on his success with the keyed trumpet, the Viennese trumpeter Anton Weidinger (1767-1852) designed a keyed horn for his twelve-year-old son Joseph, who performed on the new instrument on a concert with his father on February 28, 1813, with other performances known in 1817 and 1819 [Dahlqvist, 17]. A report in Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung in 1815 also states that Schugt, a hornist from Cologne, had successfully demonstrated a keyed horn in the fall of 1813 [E., col 636-639]. Details of the construction of the instruments of Weidinger and Schugt are not known, but at least one nineteenth-century keyed horn survives which has three large keys in the region of the bell throat and bell tail. These could be used to raise an instrument pitched in F to F-sharp, G, and A-flat, but would not allow the placement of hand in the bell of the horn and would significantly alter the tonal color as well. [NOTE: This instrument is pictured Bruchle and Janetzky, 197.]

The idea of placing keys on the horn seems to have received little notice, as did the slide horn. These inventions are however quite significant historically from the standpoint of showing a desire in some quarters to improve on the natural instruments then in use by increasing their chromatic capabilities.

[See the original article for the citations in the above quotes.]

Addressing a popular myth on why valves were invented

A major point that has frequently been made in the existing literature on the early technique of the valved horn in Germany is the idea that the valve was invented only to make quick changes of crook. The available evidence simply does not support this theory, as only a few works dating from the mid-nineteenth century are seen to use this technique. It is abundantly clear that valves were originally seen by Heinrich Stölzel and others as a way to play chromatic passagework not before possible on the horn, and especially as a way to fill in the missing low range pitches of the natural horn without resorting to right-hand technique. See the following article for a key quotation on the topic from Stölzel himself:

• Why Was the Valve Invented?

The First Works for the Valved Horn

This section is based on materials published in The Horn Call Annual 8 (1996) and The Horn Call 28, no. 3 (May, 1998).

There are a pair of highly notable but generally unknown very early works for the valved horn that are know to have been performed in Berlin before 1820.

The first and most notable of these works is a Concertino for three natural horns and chromatic horn by hornist, composer, and conductor Georg Abraham Schneider (1770-1839). This work was premiered on December 14, 1818 [SEE UPDATE, below; October 16, 1818 is the correct date]; Pfaffe performed on the valved horn, as noted in Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung 21 (January 27, 1819), col. 63. This Concertino was performed again in March of 1819, as noted in AmZ 21 (April 18, 1819), with a third performance occurring on December 15, 1819, as recorded in AmZ 22 (January 19, 1820), col. 51. The second of these works, a Concerto for three horns by a hornist named Lenss, was premiered on November 26, 1819; Andreas Schunke performed the chromatic horn part, as noted in AmZ 21 (December 22, 1819), col. 874 [sources: Dressler, 66, and Tarr, 200].

Both of these important early works date from the period that Heinrich Stoelzel (1777-1844), the inventor of the valve, was active in Berlin and, unfortunately, are very likely not extant today. That the Schneider includes a part for the chromatic horn does, however, say something important: he saw the valved horn as a completely chromatic instrument (as had Stoelzel). This is yet another piece of evidence proving that the idea that the valve was invented as a mere crook changing device is a myth.

[See the original article for the citations in the above quotes.]

UPDATE

Besides pointing to an even earlier performance of the Schneider Concertino in Berlin (October 16, 1818–as published in AMZ for November of 1818, col. 790-791–Friedrich Bode performed the valved horn), publisher Robert Ostermeyer presents a good case that his new publication of the Concerto for 4 Horns and Orchestra in E-flat by Schneider (dated on the score 30 March 1817) is in fact the same work as the Concertino. At the very least he shows that the Concertino was performed at least four times before 1820; if it is the same work as his publication he has published (spring, 2000) it is a most interesting document. The work itself would appear to have be written for natural horns; the first part, while playable on the natural horn, is nevertheless a soloistic, obbligato line compared to the other horn parts, and thus may have been intended to demonstrate the unique ability of the valved horn to perform these lines without stopped notes.

Vienna Horns: The most familiar early valved horn type

Quite a variety of valve types were made during those early years of valved horn (with the very lax patent laws of the time promoting much experimentation). Today though, in the horn world generally, one type of horn just screams early valved horn, and that is the Vienna horn with Vienna valves. For more on that, check this article:

• Vienna horns and more

Patent laws? Privileges?

It was really a different time in terms of an ability to protect your inventions. From an article that was formerly on Horn Articles Online on the history of valves we learn

The term “patented” is commonly used today, but, as was noted by Edward H. Tarr in part one of his article “The Romantic Trumpet” (Historic Brass Society Journal 5 [1993], 230), “it was apparently only in Prussia that valves were patented; in Vienna, ‘privileges’ were granted.” Tarr also pointed to a note in Philip Bate, The Trumpet and Trombone, 2nd ed. (London: Ernest Benn Ltd., 1978), 194, which is also significant with regards to early patents and valves: “The International Patents Convention, by which a number of nations agreed to respect each other’s patents, was not signed until 1883. Prior to that date there was nothing to prevent an invention, fully protected in the country of its origin, being freely copied once it had crossed the frontier. Before 1870 also, the various independent German-speaking states granted their own patents or privileges, but would not necessarily recognize one another’s unless specific trade agreements were in force.”

On piston and rotary valves

While Vienna horns were the standard in Vienna, in France and England piston valves became the standard for horn, and in most other places rotary valves were standard. A piston valved horn (set up with the French ascending third valve system) is seen below.

While piston, rotary, and Vienna valves were the most successful types, there were many types of valve applied to the horn — not to mention unusual variations on standard types. For a brief look at an example of an unusual design not seen used today, check this article on Allen valves.

Three different approaches to valves, and two important early valved hornists

This section is based on text from my dissertation. 

There were different approaches to the valve horn expressed by leading musicians and hornists of the time. The slow process of adoption of the valved horn into orchestral music was influenced greatly by three groups of musicians who exhibited differing attitudes toward the valved horn.

The first group were those musicians who fully embraced the valved horn. The performers in this group would include Heinrich Stölzel and others in Berlin, the Lewy family in Vienna and Dresden, Josef Kail in Vienna and Prague, Meifred in Paris, and, later, Franz Strauss in Munich. Early composers and critics in this group would include G. B. Bierey, Friedrich Schneider, B. D. Weber, and Gottfried Weber. Their reasons for adopting or at least advocating the valved horn included its excellent low range and full, even-toned chromatic scale. These factors also led to the rapid introduction of valved brass instruments into contemporary military bands.

The second group were those musicians who tried to “straddle the fence” and wrote music playable by both the valved horn and the natural horn. Many composers fit into this category, as they tended to be very cautious about the use of the valved horn. Some works, while intended for the valved horn, could also be performed on natural horns, and to an extent, any work written for a horn section which combined valved and natural horns is an example of this type of work. Indeed, many who were ultimately great supporters of the valved horn did not immediately embrace the instrument, including Wagner and Schumann.

The final group were those who rejected the new technology. They were more conservative and established, and undoubtedly included many hornists. Some major composers of the period, such as Mendelssohn, never utilized the instrument. Others adopted the valved horn only later, when they were certain that it in fact would be used and when they were also certain that they wanted it to be used.

The hornists I would feature for purposes of this discussion are Kopprasch and Meifred; click on the links below for more on these individuals and their early valved horn technique.

• Georg Kopprash
• Josef Meifred

The valved horn was adopted more slowly than you would guess

It should also be noted that in general composers were surprisingly slow to adopt the valved horn in the orchestra. The relative scarcity of orchestral works in particular for the instrument before 1850 is a clear indication of this.

One work has been cited pretty consistently as the first orchestral use of the valved horn. I had for many years an article on this in Horn Articles Online, based on materials published as a letter to the editor in The Horn Call Annual 7 (1995) and in my article in The Horn Call Annual 9 (1997). Introducing the work,

The orchestral début of the valved horn is the 1835 opera La Juive of Jules Halévy (1799-1862). In this work crooks are used on the valved horns in a similar manner to that seen in the Meifred Méthode. La Juive has frequently been noted for its use of valved horns without examining the nature of the writing [Runyan, 270]. The orchestration calls for four horns and includes parts for a pair of valved horns in seven of its twenty-two numbers; Meifred is recorded as performing one of the valved horn parts for the premiere [Carse, 76].

Meifred was involved! But how exactly does the valved horn writing differ from natural horn?

It can be seen that the valved horns are treated differently than the natural horns. They are used to play numerous tones in the lower range which would have to be taken as covered pitches on the natural horn, including f, f-sharp, b, f’ and a’; these pitches are clearly intended to be taken as open pitches using the valves, as evidenced by the voice crossings in measures nine and thirteen required to place these pitches in the valved horn parts.

It is clear from the orchestration of this work that Halévy employed the valved horns, pitched in several keys, primarily as fully chromatic instruments which performed principally in the low range. Halévy called for valved horns crooked in the keys of D, E-flat, E, and G, with E-flat being the most common. From the notation of the part one sees that the third and fourth horns are to switch frequently between natural and valved horns; natural horns are requested of these players in seventeen numbers, and they are to switch between valved and natural horns during the course of four numbers. Crooks requested in the natural horn sections for the third and fourth horns include B-flat basso, C, D, E-flat, E, F, G, and A. As Halévy clearly expected the hornists to make these changes of crooks on the natural horn, it follows that he also expected the hornists to change crooks on the valved horn as requested in the score; the valved horn was not seen as a fixed pitch instrument in F, as it would come to be later, and was placed in keys which Halévy believed would allow the greatest ease of performance. The choice of crooks in a more restricted range of keys from D to G would additionally allow for the proper adjustment of one set of valve slides for each crook.

This style of writing for valved horns in several different pitches is of considerable importance with regard to early German valved horn writing as well, as the opera La Juive is known to have been a significant influence upon Richard Wagner [Westernhagen, vol. 20, 105]. Wagner himself commented favorably on the work in a review of a production of Halévy’s later opera La reine de Chypre (1841) [Snedeker, “Early,” 11-12].

[See the original article for the citations in the above quotes.]

Speaking of Wagner and crazy notations

It is also interesting that La Juive was influential on Wagner, a hugely important composer for the horn! Related to that, years ago I wrote a long article highly related to Wagner and the development of his horn writing:

• “Joseph Rudolphe Lewy and Valved Horn Technique in Germany, 1837-1851.” The Horn Call Annual 9 (1997), 23-35.

While I consider it my best article, the original is chock full of footnotes and remains not one well suited to breaking up and putting online.

However, one central point of key interest to students of the horn today has to do with understanding the crazy notations in Lohengrin. These are examined in quite a bit of depth in the original article. Fortunately, I have a shorter and more easily digested discussion of that topic here in Horn Matters:

• The Prelude to Act III of Lohengrin and Crazy Horn Notations in Wagner

And a brief look at Berlioz

Finally, one other Horn Matters article I would highly recommend reading on the early valved horn is

• Muted or Open (or Stopped?) in Symphonie Fantastique?

The bigger picture importance of this article is it relates to understanding how players actually were playing these works at the time, works that we perform often today.

When we return to this series the topic will be the valved horn in the later 19th century.

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Return to Week 10 of the Horn Repertoire Course

The transition era from the natural horn to the valved horn is a fascinating one. Perhaps the clearest way to understand the basic issues at work is to focus on the natural horn writing of three major composers in this transition era, Beethoven (whose Sonata was just briefly examined in the previous installment of the University of Horn Matters series), Schubert, and Brahms.

Context: Not everyone welcomed valves with open arms

NOTE: The following section is based on materials that were for many years posted as part of a longer article on Horn Articles Online. A version of these materials was also published in my article “Brahms and the Orchestral Horn,” The Horn Call 52, No. 1 (October, 2021), 47-51.

In the nineteenth century there were a variety of attitudes toward valves. While we, from our perspective today as valved horn players, would think that the valve was a great invention and that it must have immediately been recognized as such by all parties, the valve actually had a very mixed and rather slow reception. In some areas the natural horn remained in use for many years and it certainly had its strong supporters [4]. Differing opinions circulated on the valved horn; recognition of this fact is essential in understanding the musical reality of the time.

Among composers, the lines had been drawn by the 1830s. On one side you have composers who were open to the use of valved brass instruments. One composer of this side who actually composed no works for the valved horn, making his example even more interesting, was Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1849). Commenting in 1834 on his overture Die Schöne Melusine, Op. 32 (1833), which featured the horns and trumpets outlining the minor triad (written c”, eb”, g”), Mendelssohn stated that

The E flat for the horns and trumpets I put down trusting to luck, and hoping that Providence would show the players some way to do it; if they have new contrivances for it, so much the better [5].

In other words, the work was composed to require hand stopping by not only the horns but also the trumpets (!), but Mendelssohn was open to the idea of valved instruments playing these parts [6].

On the other extreme you see composers who felt that valved brass instruments were simply a bad idea. One such composer was Karl Gottleib Reissiger (1798-1859). Reissiger was an important musical figure at the time, holding the position of Hofkapellmeister in Dresden during from 1828; this was the court where Richard Wagner (1813-1883) would hold the position of second Kapellmeister (under Reissiger) from 1843-49. Reissiger wrote in 1837 that

I hear such a beautiful, sustained solo performed in a colorless monotone on a valve horn, and it seems to me as if the instrument is moaning: ‘My love, I am a horn. Don’t you recognize me any more? I admit that I am too severely constricted, I am somewhat uncentered and hoarse, my sweetness is gone, my tone sounds as if it has to go through a filter sack in which its power gets stuck.’ [7]

His comments about the “colorless monotone” get at the idea that the tone of the horn should have shades and nuances of tonal color, a central characteristic of the tone of the natural horn. Many other later quotations relating to this same idea could be cited [8]. This division between supporters of the valved and supporters of the natural horn is central to understanding what Brahms is getting at in his horn writing, as he is the most successful of those composers whom advocated the natural horn in this period.

NOTES:

4. See for example my article, “Trashing the Valved horn? Comments on Valved and Natural horns from Turn-of-the-Century England,” The Horn Call 29, no. 1 (November, 1998), 53-56.

5. Felix Moscheles, ed., Letters of Felix Mendelssohn to Ignaz and Charlotte Moscheles (1888; repr. Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries Press, 1970), 97, cited in David Whitwell, A New History of Wind Music (Evanston, IL: The Instrumentalist, 1972), 26.

6. That Mendelssohn did not think much, however, of the keyed trumpet is shown in a letter of February 14, 1831 to clarinetist Heinrich Bärmann (1784-1847), cited in Edward H. Tarr, “The Romantic Trumpet,” part 1, Historic Brass Society Journal 5 (1993), 248, footnote 90, trans. Tarr. Of the trumpeters in Rome Mendelssohn wrote, “I must still add that the trumpeters play all the time on the accursed keyed trumpets, which seem to me like a pretty woman with a beard or like a man with breasts–they simply do not have the chromatic notes, and now it sounds like a trumpet castrato, so dull and unnatural. But there is one here who plays variations on it!”

7. C. G. Reissiger, “Über Ventilhörner und Klappentrompeten,” Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung 39 (September, 1837), 610, trans. in Ernest H. Gross III, “The Influence of Berlioz on contemporary nineteenth century use of brass instruments,” part 1, Brass Bulletin 67 (1989), 21.

8. “Trashing the Valved Horn?,” ibid.

The serious topic of aesthetics and the hand horn

Continuing a thought expressed in the quote above, there is a very serious topic of aesthetics to consider. Dauprat in his Method (published in 1824, a massive publication) gets at the idea that shifts of tonal color from open notes to stopped notes was to be desired and gave important shades and nuances to the sound of the horn. His comments may be read in the brief article linked below:

• Dauprat on the Tone of the Natural Horn

Links related to Beethoven, Schubert, and Brahms

Longer articles specifically related to Beethoven, Schubert, and Brahms are linked below, and will be considered to be required reading for those following the University of Horn Matters series in full.

• E. C. Lewy and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 (1824)
• Schubert Nachtgesang Im Walde (1827)
• Schubert Auf dem Strom (1828)
• The Brahms Horn Trio (1865) 
• Brahms and the Orchestral Horn

Question older sources and conventional wisdom on horn history

In all of the above articles there is a bigger picture to see, and that is that there is an older literature on horn history that says some sketchy things that modern students of horn history need to keep clear. They would include:

• Beethoven 9 is rumored to have been for valved horn but that is not the case, it is natural horn writing even if the first player to perform it was a valved horn pioneer,
• Schubert did not compose Auf dem Strom for valved horn either; it is still natural horn writing even if associated with the brother of the same valved horn pioneer associated with Beethoven 9, and
• Brahms wrote all his horn parts for natural horn, there is no indication at all that he was thinking of sections split between natural and valved horns in any way, natural horn writing for him was to maintain traditions as part of an anti-Wagner stance

As to major natural horn players and teachers of the time, in terms of today certainly the best known is Jacques-François Gallay (1795-1864), as several volumes of his etudes have become standards. This image is from his Method. For an introduction to Gallay and one of his best known publications please read:

• The Non-measured Preludes of Jacques-François Gallay

In honor of Gallay, the featured horn image is a horn of his time, Halari as copied by Richard Seraphinoff.

The nineteenth century was a transition era; it took us from the natural horn with no valves to the double horn! We will have more on that era in the next installment of the University of Horn Matters.

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Return to Week 9 of the Horn Repertoire Course

The Classical period saw the horn gain immense popularity as a solo instrument and as a member of orchestras and wind groups.

The two main designs in use

By the end of the eighteenth century two primary types of natural horns were found in general use, the most common being the orchestral horn. The earliest instruments of this type were seen as early as 1703 but lacked a central tuning slide, which was added to the instrument by the 1760s. This design features terminal crooks, which lie between the mouthpiece and the body of the horn, and can be made in various lengths to place the horn into keys as high as C alto and as low as B-flat basso. This small illustration is from the Kastner, Manuel Général de Musique Militaire.

The other type of natural horn was known as the Cor Solo. This particular model was introduced by the Paris maker Raoux in 1781, but is derived from the German Inventionshorn, introduced in Dresden in the 1750s. This type of horn featured crooks, which were inserted into the middle of the instrument in the manner of tuning slides. These crooks are variously called internal, insert, or sliding crooks, and were normally made in the period to crook the instrument only in the central keys of G, F, E, E-flat, and D. An example of this type of instrument is illustrated here, a French Cor-Solo as illustrated in the Gallay Methode.

A great period for the horn

This was a great period for the horn. In terms of technical developments, the two major developments of the late Baroque, the division of horn playing by range between high and low horn players and hand horn technique, were fully adopted by players in this period, and while horns did vary in terms of internal dimensions from area, after the adoption of a central tuning slide the overall design of the instrument was set.

Not only were the technique and construction of the horn both fairly stable in this period, but also it is one that would see the horn become firmly established as a standard instrument in the orchestra and also fully take its place as an important solo instrument.

An important aside: Mouthpieces

It is important to note that mouthpieces in this period differed a great deal from those used today. They were made of sheet metal and were very deep, complementing the design of the natural horn in terms of tone and flexibility. A typical modern mouthpiece does not sound or work that well on natural horn.

In my own playing on natural horn I typically use a “compromise” mouthpiece, but, if you are serious about playing the natural horn on Classical period works, you need to track down a mouthpiece such as this one made by Richard Seraphinoff.

A new resource: Method books

It is also in this period that method books were first published for the horn. In particular the comments found in the method of Heinrich Domnich (1767-1844) are especially important to study today. My article is a bit of a long read, but well worth the trouble, as it clearly lays out the state of natural horn playing at a high level in the early 19th century.

• The Heinrich Domnich Méthode and the Natural Horn

The horn as a soloist

While there were many great works for horn composed in the Classical period, the works that tower over all others are the Mozart concertos. As they are very well known in the horn community I would offer these two articles for additional reading and background:

• Mozart Horn Concertos: Fragments and Good Intentions. By Bruce Hembd
• Who Wrote Mozart’s Horn Concerto K. 412? By John Ericson

Another composer I like to feature in any look at the Classical solo horn repertoire is Rosetti. He wrote a lot of music for the horn! Haydn wrote some great music as well! Recommended, brief reading:

• The Rosetti Horn Concertos. By John Ericson
• Who Wrote the Haydn Double Concerto, and a New Arrangement for Winds

A final work among many that could be noted in this brief overview would be the Sonata, Op. 17 of Beethoven, which is certainly the first great sonata for the horn and is today the most frequently performed horn sonata from the era. Composed for an April 18, 1800 performance in Vienna with the horn virtuoso Johann Stich (1746-1803, better known under the Italianized name of Giovanni Punto) the work features the horn and piano as equal partners. In terms of technical requirements the work is composed for performance by a low horn player of the time with highly idiomatic arpeggio figures. The “factitious” written low G is also idiomatic (this was not a true note in the harmonic series and would have been obtained by bending the pitch down with the lips from low C; this pitch will center with a clear tonal color), and with a general range that never goes above written g’’ it is a work that is very suited to modern natural horn study.

When we return the topic will be the natural horn in the Romantic period.

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Return to Week 7 of the Horn Repertoire Course

To continue we today have what is likely to be one of the longer articles of this series, as it is on a topic where the conventional wisdom needs reexamined. It will conclude as well with a look at an exciting new model of early Classical natural horn that is now available for purchase and use today.

The conventional wisdom

Dresden hornist Anton Joseph Hampel (1710-1771) is frequently credited with either inventing or codifying hand horn technique sometime after 1750. As this is repeated in so many sources, I was curious how this was documented, how it became the conventional wisdom on this topic.

The primary source behind the Hampel story is the Méthode de Premier et de Second Cor (1808) of Heinrich Domnich (1767-1844). Domnich was a student of the great horn virtuoso Johann Stich (1746-1803), who was better known under the Italianized name of Giovanni Punto, and it is thought that Domnich had obtained his information from Punto. Punto had been a pupil of Hampel and later also published an edition of a horn method by Hampel.

To briefly summarize the account presented by Domnich, Hampel was experimenting with mutes of wood when he was struck by the idea of inserting a pad of cotton into the bell of the horn, inspired by contemporary oboe players who inserted cotton into the bell of the oboe to soften the tone of the instrument. In the words of Domnich,

It was a ray of light to him … he saw the means, by introducing and pulling out the stopper alternately, of running through the diatonic and chromatic scale of all keys without interruption. Then he composed for the horn new music where he introduced some notes which until now were strange to him. Some time after, having noticed that the stopper could be replaced advantageously by the hand, he ceased to use it.

Before this revolution, fortunate as it was brilliant, the manner of holding the horn was the same as that used today (1808) for the tromp de chasse [hunting horn]. But as the arm on which it was supported was required for the execution of the stopped notes, the holding of the instrument was changed….

Creator, in a sense, of a new instrument, Hampel, who was not experienced in his youth in the practice of stopped notes, restricted the usage to slow pieces. It was reserved for one of his disciples to give to this discovery all the extension and brilliance of which it was capable.

[Heinrich Domnich, Méthode de Premier et de Second Cor (Paris: Le Roy, 1808), III-V, trans. in Birchard Coar, A Critical Study of the Nineteenth Century Horn Virtuosi in France (DeKalb, IL: Birchard Coar, 1952), 6-8.]

Domnich was the first to answer the question of who invented hand horn technique and virtually every account since that date has in one way or another simply repeated his account.

Questions could be asked

It is worth noting that the account of Domnich was published after the death of Punto, the supposed source of this information on events which had occurred over 50 years previously. The story Domnich presented is certainly very believable, but, on the other hand, believability is certainly not a standard by which one can prove anything to be a factual, accurate assessment of history. In fact, a skeptic could even begin to question the motives of Domnich, Punto, or both for presenting this story. Without question there is a certain note of status and authority a musician obtains by having received information passed on to them directly from a famous expert–and Hampel we are told invented hand horn technique, making him the final expert on this important topic. Did Domnich present facts in his story, or did he or Punto perhaps bend the facts just a little bit?

Looking at the Baroque horn, again

Before addressing this question more directly it would be best to first briefly examine Baroque horn technique in general. The Baroque horn, addressed in the first article in this series, is similar in many respects to the Classical natural horn. As I have a short overview of how the natural horn works elsewhere, please take a minute to review this article. The photo below is another view of the Baroque natural horn after J. W. Haas by Richard Seraphinoff, mentioned in the earlier University of Horn Matters article and published here with permission.

Baroque horns generally have a smaller bore and bell size than that of horns used in the Classical period, could be built in a fixed pitch or could utilize terminal crooks, and did not have a tuning slide.

It would not be difficult to hand stop a Baroque horn

In general the size the overall wrap of the instrument is larger than that of the Classical natural horn, but not so large that it would be of any great difficulty to place a hand in the bell for the purpose of hand-stopping. This fact alone is perhaps the first reason to question the idea that hand-stopping was not used on the Baroque horn, as it is certainly not difficult to stop the bell of a Baroque horn with the hand. In fact, it is quite likely that horn players must have begun to experiment with hand-horn technique as soon as they figured out that they could put their hand into the bell–almost immediately after the horn was created.

Hand horn technique was know by 1720 in Dresden

Thomas Hiebert in his article, “Virtuosity, Experimentation, and Innovation in Horn Writing From Early 18th-Century Dresden,” published in the Historic Brass Society Journal 4 (1992), addresses the subject of Hampel and the beginnings hand-horn technique in Dresden in quite some depth. Hampel joined the Dresden Hofkapelle in 1737, but Hiebert points out convincingly that hand-horn technique was actually known by hornists working there before 1720. Specifically, the second movement of J. D. Heinichen’s Sonata, written ca. 1719, requires a number of notes outside the harmonic series and could represent one of the first experiments with hand-stopping in Dresden.

The frequency of the use of notes outside the harmonic series increased with the arrival of Hampel in 1737, with an especially notable example to be found in a concerto for violin by Franz Benda (1709-1786), dating to 1740. Hiebert also commented in his subsequent article in The Cambridge Companion to Brass Instruments (1997) that this Dresden work exhibited “a very advanced form” of hand-stopping. A concerto from this period, traced to Dresden and thought to be by Hampel, also required “a developed form of hand-stopping in a two octave scale from the twelfth harmonic down to the third (from G5 to G3).” Hiebert further states that “this would not be possible by lipping or partial hand-stopping.”

And it was known outside Dresden

Evidence of hand stopping is to be found in period musical works outside of Dresden as well. Hiebert in particular (in the Cambridge Companion article) notes that

Others were involved with experiments similar to those at Dresden. In 1792 Ernst Ludwig Gerber mentions that Bachmann, second hornist at Sondershausen, was using a fluent right-hand technique by 1750, and a concerto for second horn by Franz Xavier Pkorny dated 1754 contains a passage remarkably similar to that referred to above, written by Hampel. Pkorny’s and Leopold Mozart’s concerti for two horns from the 1750s, possibly written for horn players at Regensburg and Wallerstein, were among the first in the genre of the true double concerto in the more Classical style. They also show similarities to the writing characteristics used in Dresden, with well-defined first and second horn techniques including factitious tones.

That hand-stopping was practiced in a variety of locations by a variety of players in the 1750s speaks volumes toward an earlier date of invention than traditionally cited.

Hand horn technique was widely known, at least among the best players

Richard Seraphinoff in his thought provoking article “Nodal Venting on the Baroque Horn: A Study in Non-Historical Performance Practice,” published in The Horn Call 27, no. 1 (November, 1996), points to still more evidence that hand-horn technique was known in the Baroque period. This article is posted in full in his website and I would suggest that those seriously interested in horn history read it in full. He notes in the article that hand-horn technique is mentioned specifically in several sources very near the oft mentioned date of its “invention”–and it is not mentioned as a new or revolutionary technique in horn methods dated to 1764 and ca. 1770, which is in itself quite revealing. Why? Because it tends to confirm again that hand stopping the bell was in fact not a new technique, that it was already a widely known technique.

Perhaps one of the most fascinating theories Seraphinoff presents in his article relates to the horn parts of Bach, where he wrote that

Additional questions arise when playing Bach’s horn parts. There are so many non-harmonic series notes in Bach that one might think that the players must have had some method of altering the pitch of the open overtones other than bending the notes with the embouchure. One theory, put forth by Lowell Greer, speculates that parts marked with the notation “corno di tirarsi,” which are some of the most chromatic of Bach’s horn parts, may not have been intended for some sort of “slide” horn, but may in fact have been played on the normal Baroque horn using the hand to “slide” or pull the pitch down from an harmonic series note to its chromatic neighbor. This is an interesting and plausible theory, but one for which there is no evidence at present.

But did horn players in the Baroque put a hand in the bell?

The central point to examine is this: did fine horn players in the Baroque place their right hand in the bell? Certainly many period illustrations do in fact show horn players holding their bells in air, but Seraphinoff notes that with the “lack of quick communication and easy travel in the eighteenth century” practices must have varied from place to place. In short, as a performer Seraphinoff prefers to use hand stopping on the Baroque horn because he feels that this practice emulates

… the technique of the best horn players of the Baroque era. We must give the players of the period the benefit of the doubt and assume that they were clever enough to try the experiment of putting the hand into the bell to correct intonation when asked by a conductor or violinist or oboist to “please do something about those out of tune notes,” a request that was probably made more than once in the early part of the eighteenth century. Job security has always been the mother of invention.

Hand-horn technique in some form was certainly know by the 1720s at the latest–the idea that it was either invented or codified by Hampel around 1750-1760 is merely a plausible sounding myth. Hampel did, of course, make a significant mark as both an important performer in Dresden and as the teacher of Punto, and the point is not to belittle those facts. But his real contributions must be placed into proper context and not reach mythical proportions in a vain quest to assign a name and date to the invention of hand-horn technique, when in fact there is very likely no one name and no one date that can ultimately ever be assigned.

Developments seen in the horns used in the early Classical period

As Richard Seraphinoff has been mentioned prominently in this article I would close this rather long installment with information on a new model of early classical orchestra horn which he is now producing and is illustrated here. This instrument is based on an instrument by Anton Kerner senior (1726-1806) of Vienna, the original dated 1760 on bell garland. It has a very narrow bell profile, the significance of which will become clear as we read his description of the instrument.

This is an important instrument, because it fills the gap between the baroque orchestra horn, now often played “bells up” for pre-1750 literature, and the classical horn, which makers have most often copied from instruments of around 1800 or later. The period that has been neglected includes most of the output of Joseph Haydn, W. A. Mozart, Rosetti, the Mannheim composers, and other early classical composers.

The easy upper range helps to explain the early solo, chamber, and symphonic writing of Haydn, Johann Stamitz symphonies, Rosetti solo and double concertos, and other high horn playing in the early classical style when the clarino range was still very much part of the high horn player’s technique. The horn is also remarkable for its clear, centered stopped notes throughout the range, which indicates that the development of this type of bell design was necessary for the further refinement of the chromatic handstopping technique begun by Josef Hampl and the previous generation of players.

This is likely the kind of horn used by German players in the important centers of horn playing, and apparently by German horn players working in Paris. This would presumably have been the type of instrument used in the 1760s and 70s by the early traveling soloists such as Punto, Türrschmidt, and Palsa, using a well developed system of chromatic handstopping.

These natural horns are different than those used later

For those serious about playing early Classical horn literature on authentic, period instruments this model is certainly one that must be looked into, as it differs significantly from the natural horns used in the 19th century. When we return to this series next weekend the topic will be the horn in the Classical period.

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