Reading the posts on the Prom 4 thread, I was very taken with the interchange between Laurie Watt and Waldhorn (messages #43-46) regarding horn vibrato then and now.
Threatening to go a little off post, but relevent to the discussion. Then, in message #62 Quilisma posted a long and very interesting message on the subject of horn vibrato, styles of playing and the variation between countries.
So I thought it might be interesting for members to learn a little more about the mysteries and legends of that instrument (which we horn players make no attempt to deny!)
So let me start with those messages which first aroused my interest:
LaurieWatt #43
Waldhorn #441.
Laurie Watt #45
1.
Waldhorn #44
... and here is where Quilisma #62 appeared
Perhaps at this stage, we should drop the words "french horn" so as not to cofuse anyone. The reference is of course, as Quilisma states, to the narrow bore piston horn, usually pitched in F, but with interchangeable "crooks" in B flat, A, G, E flat, D and C (Going downwards).
The gradual change over from this narrow bore instrument to the wider bore "German" (another misnomer) was probably started at the turn of the twentieth century in this country by the great Adolf Borsdorf, leader of that famous LSO quartet known as "God's own Quartet" for their brilliant ensemble playing.
So read what Quilisma writes in his first paragraph. I can only add that the change over to the wide bored instrument developed quickly but the Great Aubrey Brain stood out firmly against "...that dreadful euphonium sound" and refused to have them in his section (BBC Symphony Orchestra) for a long time, before being forced to concede.
His son Dennis performed wonders on the piston horn, including that famous recording of Britten's Serenade with Peter Peers, but even he was placed in the position of having to blend his sound with that of his Philharmonia colleagues and, to Aubrey's disgust, changed to a medium bore rotary valve instrument.
For the moment, I shall leave it there for others to contribute their views and I'm sure that waldhorn, (whose knowledge about horn playing goes back to the time when London was still a Roman Camp
) can no doubt be a lot more informative than I.
HS
Threatening to go a little off post, but relevent to the discussion. Then, in message #62 Quilisma posted a long and very interesting message on the subject of horn vibrato, styles of playing and the variation between countries.
So I thought it might be interesting for members to learn a little more about the mysteries and legends of that instrument (which we horn players make no attempt to deny!)
So let me start with those messages which first aroused my interest:
LaurieWatt #43
NOT authentic and not really convincing IMHO
...and what about the missing authentic vibrato on horns and trumpets, particularly the horns? The result was very unFrench although I enjoyed the performance immensely and, listened to via my Internet radio, the sound quality and dynamic range of the broadcast was extremely impressive
...and what about the missing authentic vibrato on horns and trumpets, particularly the horns? The result was very unFrench although I enjoyed the performance immensely and, listened to via my Internet radio, the sound quality and dynamic range of the broadcast was extremely impressive
Thankfully, in 1913 the sort of French horn vibrato which eventually came to be heard in the old Paris Conservatoire orchestra in the 1940s through to the 1960s and even the early 1970s had not yet emerged as part and parcel of 'French style'. The leading player in the early 1900s until the 1930s, E. Vuillermoz, is known to have eschewed vibrato and this can clearly be heard on some of his lovely recordings with piano accompaniment, where his tone is rich, full, darker-hued than his successor Lucien Thevet, and without even a hint of 'wobble'.
1.
Thank you for that, err, W; fascinating! I had no idea it was such a recent phenomenon.
L
P.S. I had thought the vibrato was a legacy of hunting horn days!
L
P.S. I had thought the vibrato was a legacy of hunting horn days!
One can certainly hear the pronounced vibrato of the Parisian 'cors-de-chasses' in a wonderful old Emil Berliner wax cylinder recording from the 1890s but my understanding is that there were two distinct styles: that of the hunting horn, with vibrato, and 'orchestral' style, without vibrato.
I'm fascinated to read what Waldhorn says about horn (and more generally brass) vibrato, as this coincides precisely with what I had gleaned over the past couple of years: namely, that the allegedly characteristic "French vibrato" was in fact a fairly short-lived phenomenon very much associated with a few specific players in Paris, who came to prominence in the 1930s and dominated in the 1940s and 1950s, but that that style of playing gradually went out of fashion as the 1960s progressed. Also, around 1970 French horn players started moving over from the narrow-bore French-design piston-valve instrument to the medium-bore or wide-bore German-design rotary-valve instrument, thereby joining the global mainstream (in which the only remaining exception is Vienna with its somewhat arcane "third option"). British orchestras had shifted from narrow-bore French-design piston-valve horns to medium-bore or wide-bore German-design rotary-valve instruments a few decades before, roughly between 1930 and 1950, principally because the rotary-valve horns offered greater security and a larger sound before edginess kicks in. (At the beginning of the twentieth century German horn designers had devised a "double horn" in F and B flat, but an equivalent was not introduced for French-style instruments until they were already obsolescent.) But vibrato or no vibrato, it's always worth remembering that, as a legacy of the narrow-bore piston-valve single horn in F, the traditional French conception of horn sound is more focussed, direct and ringing than we hear from some players around the world, without a hint of woofiness, and that this could also be said for the British school of playing at least until the late twentieth century. I suppose the opposite would be the super-wide bouncy castle of plush-mush surround sofa-sound one sometimes hears from unidentified places...
"French vibrato" isn't the only type, though, and as Stravinsky was Russian I should mention "Russian vibrato". If The Rite of Spring had been premièred not in Paris as Le Sacre du printemps but in St Petersburg as Весна священная, how differently would it have sounded? I think I'm right in saying that Russian players used mostly German-style instruments, but again that may not be right. However, Russia is again famous for brass vibrato. I'd love to know when this tradition developed. Was it already the norm by 1913? I have read that it developed earlier than "French vibrato", in which case it may have been one of the influences that produced "French vibrato" (the more celebrated one being jazz). There is a parallel tradition of a "lyrical" vibrato emanating from Prague and certain other places in central Europe (also to be heard in some German orchestras), and this may have fed into the Russian playing style, but also within Russia there are two contrasting traditions: the relatively moderate vibrato of St Petersburg/Petrograd/Leningrad and the positively extreme operatic wobble of Moscow. The latter seems to have been tamed somewhat during Khrushchev's era, but to the world at large Russian brass (especially horns) implies prominent vibrato. Actually, most Russian players "internationalised" their style of playing at least as long ago as the end of the Soviet Union, leaving barely a hint of vibrato and only for soloistic purposes. But when did vibrato BEGIN in Russian playing? Was it always there? Or was it a Soviet-era phenomenon peaking mid-century? As he was composing, what sounds would Stravinsky have expected to hear if he had heard a Russian orchestra playing The Rite of Spring? The questions keep multiplying
"French vibrato" isn't the only type, though, and as Stravinsky was Russian I should mention "Russian vibrato". If The Rite of Spring had been premièred not in Paris as Le Sacre du printemps but in St Petersburg as Весна священная, how differently would it have sounded? I think I'm right in saying that Russian players used mostly German-style instruments, but again that may not be right. However, Russia is again famous for brass vibrato. I'd love to know when this tradition developed. Was it already the norm by 1913? I have read that it developed earlier than "French vibrato", in which case it may have been one of the influences that produced "French vibrato" (the more celebrated one being jazz). There is a parallel tradition of a "lyrical" vibrato emanating from Prague and certain other places in central Europe (also to be heard in some German orchestras), and this may have fed into the Russian playing style, but also within Russia there are two contrasting traditions: the relatively moderate vibrato of St Petersburg/Petrograd/Leningrad and the positively extreme operatic wobble of Moscow. The latter seems to have been tamed somewhat during Khrushchev's era, but to the world at large Russian brass (especially horns) implies prominent vibrato. Actually, most Russian players "internationalised" their style of playing at least as long ago as the end of the Soviet Union, leaving barely a hint of vibrato and only for soloistic purposes. But when did vibrato BEGIN in Russian playing? Was it always there? Or was it a Soviet-era phenomenon peaking mid-century? As he was composing, what sounds would Stravinsky have expected to hear if he had heard a Russian orchestra playing The Rite of Spring? The questions keep multiplying
The gradual change over from this narrow bore instrument to the wider bore "German" (another misnomer) was probably started at the turn of the twentieth century in this country by the great Adolf Borsdorf, leader of that famous LSO quartet known as "God's own Quartet" for their brilliant ensemble playing.
So read what Quilisma writes in his first paragraph. I can only add that the change over to the wide bored instrument developed quickly but the Great Aubrey Brain stood out firmly against "...that dreadful euphonium sound" and refused to have them in his section (BBC Symphony Orchestra) for a long time, before being forced to concede.
His son Dennis performed wonders on the piston horn, including that famous recording of Britten's Serenade with Peter Peers, but even he was placed in the position of having to blend his sound with that of his Philharmonia colleagues and, to Aubrey's disgust, changed to a medium bore rotary valve instrument.
For the moment, I shall leave it there for others to contribute their views and I'm sure that waldhorn, (whose knowledge about horn playing goes back to the time when London was still a Roman Camp
) can no doubt be a lot more informative than I.HS
- lots of stuff here of which I was unaware (as a lapsed violinist, I'd always assumed that when you depressed a valve, the pitch went up! 
). Can I just clarify that I've got this right - on a Valved instrument, if you don't use the valves, you get the "natural" notes (eg C - F - G - A); press the first valve and these become Bb - Eb - F - G; the second creates B - E - F# - G#; and the third A - D - E - F#? And that to get C#, the player has to use 2 + 3 and adjust the embouchure/hand in bell position? And using 1 + 2 + 3 the result is a sharp tritone from the open notes? And that you can get microtonal alterations from using combinations of valves?
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