![the art of french horn playing mutes the art of french horn playing mutes](https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0149/6436/products/Farkas-The_Art_of_French_Horn_Playing-3_1024x1024.jpg)
Often they write ‘con sordino’ when they really expect hand muting and vice versa. Not knowing the difference, they write in their scores simply ‘muted’ or the equivalent in their own language.
![the art of french horn playing mutes the art of french horn playing mutes](https://media.wired.com/photos/59344792f061de0423ccd721/master/pass/louis_armstrong.jpg)
Many composers are not very clear about the difference in the sounds produced by using a mute and that of hand muting (or hand stopping). In explaining this he takes the opportunity to chastise composers who don’t understand the effects requested in their own music. While he has several practical notes on muting (“It is not necessary to jam or grind the mute in” for example) Gunther Schuller in Horn Technique is especially concerned with the musical side of the horn mute question in the orchestra. Farkas also explains that the terms schmetternd and cuivre “refer only to the player’s ability to get a hard, brassy sound on the open horn by unduly tightening the embouchure with a ‘smile’ and forcing the tone.” ( I have a longer list here, with the most important terms related to muted and stopped horn marked). I believe that this is a rather serious mistake and, to some composers, a downright affront.įarkas gives an overview of some of the more confusing notations of Ravel and Debussy and offered a short list of terms related to muted and stopped horn. The is a distinct difference between the sound of a muted horn note and a hand-stopped note, as most composers are well aware but players are inclined to treat this difference lightly and use whichever method suits their convenience. Quoting from The Art of French Horn Playing,įirst let us clarify the myriad terms used to denote muting or hand-stopping. In general the topic of muted horn appears to have been of no great concern for Farkas from a technical standpoint (“with proper practice, the change in resistance caused by the mute will not be upsetting”), but certainly the mutes of the 1950s must have required more adjustments of corks than we expect to see today, and there was the musical side of things to address as well.