French Horn
The French horn (so called to distinguish it from the
english horn, a
member of the oboe family) is the developed European orchestral member of
the true horn family. The instrument is classified technically as a
lip-vibrated aerophone, characterized by a conical bore and funnel-shaped
mouthpiece, as opposed to the cylindrical bore and cup-shaped mouthpiece
of the trumpet family. Descended from primitive animal-horn prototypes
(for example, the biblical shofar), short, curved horns were used in
medieval Europe primarily as signal instruments, especially for the hunt;
they could usually be relied on only for the rhythmic sounding of a single
pitch. In the late 16th and 17th centuries the horn, from this time
usually made of brass, was lengthened and coiled--first in a small, spiral
coil, later in a wider, open loop. By the late 17th century in France the
cor de chasse ("hunting horn") emerged with a wide, flaring bell and a
tube length of up to 4.37 m (14 ft), the obvious prototype of the modern
instrument. Responsive to a greatly increased number of its natural
overtones, the cor de chasse possessed a wide enough range of pitches for
use in the orchestra of the early 18th century. The addition of "crooks"
(curved extensions to the tubing of various lengths) and the
technique--attributed to the Dresden virtuoso Anton Joseph Hampel--of
altering the pitch by stopping the bell with the hand made the horn still
more complete melodically in its middle ranges, thus greatly increasing
its versatility in the orchestra of the classical period of Haydn and
Mozart. Also at this time (the late 18th century) the cup-shaped,
trumpetlike mouthpiece was abandoned for the funnel-shaped mouthpiece of
the modern horn, resulting in a smoother, less raucous sound. During the
early 19th century valves were added (patented in 1818 by Heinrich Stolzel
and Friedrich Bluhmel in Berlin) to vary the playing length of the tube,
yielding an instrument virtually chromatic (proceeding by semitones)
throughout its range. Although it was slow to be accepted, the valve horn
prevailed by the end of the 19th century. The modern French horn is
usually pitched in F, and has three valves and a tube length of about 3.75
m (12 ft). The great demands on the resources of the horn have led to the
widespread adoption of the "double horn," in which a separate set of coils
for a horn in B-flat is added to a horn in F, a fourth valve acting as a
switch between the two sets of coils.
Here are the French Horn players of WHS
Ashley Goulet
Ronnie Farcloth
Kelly Klimitz
Andrea Giraldo