At His Majesty’s Pleasure by Martyn Harry, His Majesty’s Sagbutts & Cornetts (Sfz Music sfxm0412, 2012).

Cornetts: Jamie Savan, Jeremy West, Gawain Glenton, Sam Goble, Sackbuts: Adam Woolf, Abigail Newman, Miguel Tantos, Steve Saunders, chamber organ, harpsichord: Michael Bonaventure, harpsichord: Kathryn Cok, Conductor: Martyn Harry.

Those who attended the HBS Symposium in New York this past July 2012 had the chance to hear His Majesty’s Sagbutts & Cornetts perform a substantial portion of this contemporary large-scale 19 movement suite. It is an imaginative program piece called an “instrumental opera” that depicts the enthronmement, brief reign, and ultimate abdication of an imagined Tudor child-King of 550 years ago.
Harry wrote a virtuoso piece that effectively captures the qualities of the cornett and sackbut ensemble but does so with many tonal contemporary techniques. Each movement depicts a department or member of the Royal Household and the child-King’s struggle with the political forces and intrigue set at play to maintain the status quo of the State.

The instrumentation in the movements varies and range from instrumental solos to scoring for the full ensemble accompanied by two keyboards. The writing, although contemporary in style, is largely tonal. Martyn Harry is able to capture the drama of the imaginary young monarch with great skill. This piece is a virtuoso work and the members of HMS&C perform with great precision and musicality even though the music certainly takes them out of the typical comfort zone of a cornett and sackbut group. Live performance adds an important dimension to this theatre piece but as it is an instrumental work with no theatrical dialogue this CD recording still captures the dramatic quality of the story. I hope other composers might follow Martyn Harry’s lead and add more literature of this type to the ever expanding contemporary repertoire for early brass instruments.
-- Jeffrey Nussbaum

Hanjörg Angerer (natural horn) and Wolfgang Brunner (conductor Salburger Hofmusik), Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Horn Concertos (Universität Mozarteum Salzburg UNIMOZ 28 www.moz.ac.at), Recorded April 10 -12, 2006. Ordering information: www.blaeserphilharmonie-mozarteum.at or e-mail This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Mozart’s horn masterpieces KV 495, KV 412, KV 514, KV 447, and KV 417 are among the most prized joys of all brass compositions. Hanjörg Angerer’s performance is nothing short of spectacular. Angerer is playing on a natural horn by an anonymous Bohemian maker from about 1800 from the private collection of Michael Walter of Vienna. His playing has that rare combination of being technically flawless as well as musically expressive. Quite a number of recordings of these works have been released in the past number of years and this one is, without question, my favorite. The articulation is absolutely clean and he makes the most of the expressive opportunities the hand-stopped notes offer. The tempi are brisk in the allegros and rondo movements. Angerer manages to bring out the depth of emotion that Mozart created in these masterpieces.

Composer Paul Angerer has presented an informative history of these works in the CD notes. He offers a concise view on untangling the chronology of the pieces. He also deals with views on other composers such as Sussmyer and Franz Beyer who have had a history with the horn pieces. There is also ample discussion about the actual manuscripts and Mozart’s relationship with the hornist Joseph Leutgeb (1732). Paul Angerer wrote the horn cadenzas performed on this recording and he captures the essence of the Classical style beautifully. He contends that Mozart wrote the Concert in E flat KV495 just five months after completing The Magic Flute. As such, Angerer cleverly employed various themes from that opera in the candenza.

Wolfgang Brunner and the Salburger Hofmusik ensemble offer a supportive and wonderfully played role to Angerer’s virtuosic performance. I as well as many other brass players have the legendary recordings by Dennis Brain as the aural signature of how the Mozart horn concerti should sound. Hanjörg Angerer’s recording can bear positive comparison to those great performances comfortably.
-- Jeffrey Nussbaum

Minor Returns: Tributes to the Horn in Jazz, by Jeffrey Snedeker, horn (JS4 Self-Published, 2010)

Featuring; John Sanders; piano, Isaac Castillo; bass, Garey Williams; drums, Tom Varner; horn, Lenny Price; alto sax, John Harbaugh; trumpet, Curtis Peacock; tuba, Saul Cline; tenor sax, Phil Dean; trombone, Mark Claassen; baritone sax with the Central Washington University Jazz Band and Central Washington University Symphony Orchestra Strings.

Jeffrey Snedeker, known to many HBS readers as a virtuoso natural horn and early valve horn player and horn scholar, has revealed another side of his multi-dimensional musical personality on this CD. It turns out he is also a fine jazz player who has a deep affection for the genre with a particular interest in the place of his chosen instrument in jazz. In this self-produced CD Snedeker, a professor at Central Washington University, draws upon the assistance of many from the CWU community including colleagues as well as former and current students.

There are 14 cuts on this recording of mostly jazz standards, but some less known material including two original compositions by Snedeker’s brother Gregory and the Allegretto from Jazz Symphony no.1 by John Graas. Jeffrey Snedeker has done research on Graas, a pioneer in jazz horn. It is the focus on the horn that most makes this recording a particularly interesting one. The Graas Jazz Symphony was written in 1956 and an octet version was published a year later. Two French Fries, composed by Gigi Gryce for the Oscar Pettiford Big Band and recorded in 1956 originally featured hornists Julius Watkins amd David Amram. Snedeker and invited artist Tom Varner do an admirable job recreating that pioneering recording. Also featuring Varner is George Butcher’s Linda Delia which was originally recorded by Julius Watkins in 1955. Snedeker brings out a lively interpretation of George Wallington’s Godchild which was originally recorded by Miles Davis on his famous Birth of the Cool (1949-1950) recording. Snedeker points out in his liner notes that the hornists on that seminal recording, Addision “Junior” Collins, Sandy Siegelstein, and Gunther Schuller were not given an opportunity to improvise but this current recording rectifies that issue. Also playing tribute to Miles Davis is Jeff Snedeker’s performance of Summertime recreating the beautiful arrange from Davis’s recording Porgy and Bess which originally included Julius Watkins, Willie Ruff, and Gunther Schuller. An interesting horn connection, pointed out in liner notes, is the recording of Thelonious Monk’s Straight, No Chaser. There is a striking similarity in Monk’s melody to the famous orchestral horn excerpt in Richard Strauss’ Till Eulenspiegel. Also in the realm of classical/jazz fusion is Moonlove which is an adaptation of the slow movement of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 which has been recorded by Glenn Miller and others. Paul Desmond’s famous Take Five is included as a tribute to Russian jazz hornist Arkady Shilkloper who wrote an arrangement featuring the horn and is recreated on this recording.

Jeffrey Snedeker did an admirable job as did his colleagues on this CD. Not only are there some lovely performances but we have been given a fresh perspective on a little appreciated instrument in the history of jazz.

-- Jeffrey Nussbaum

The Renaissance Trombone, Querstand. Recorded October 2010.
Ercole Nisini, trombone; Uta Schmidt, recorder; Zita Mikijanska, organ/virginal; Monika Fischaleck, dulcian; Nora Thiele, historical drums

The Baroque Trombone, Querstand. Recorded October 2011
Ercole Nisini, trombone; Monika Fischaleck, baroque bassoon; Rebecca Maurer, harpsichord. With Jiri Sycha, violin; Amrai Groβe, violin; Angelika Grünert, viola.

Website for the project: http://thehistoricaltrombone.com/

Aficionados of early-music trombone playing have a lot to be happy about these days. Performers such as Wim Becu, Daniel Lassale, Michel Becquet, Adam Woolf, Jorgen Van Rijen, and others have raised the level and visibility of the instrument as a solo instrument within Renaissance and Baroque music. Two recent important entries onto the scene are the first CDs from a larger project titled The Historical Trombone by Ercole Nisini and Instrumenta Musica. The CDs, logically titled The Renaissance Trombone and The Baroque Trombone, highlight Nisini as a soloist within chamber music settings that feature historical instruments. While the entire project follows the traditional music history periodization and while musically the two CD’s share a common approach to phrasing and sound, these two CD’s differ in their overall approach to establishing the trombone as a solo instrument.

The Renaissance Trombone emphasizes the Renaissance tradition of composed improvisations and elaborations on well known melodies. The composers that Nisini draws on for this CD—Giovanni Bassano, Giovanni Battista Bovicelli, and Diego Ortiz—all published instruction manuals for instrumentalists who wanted to learn to improvise in this style. As teachers, they provided written examples using some of the most popular polyphonic late Renaissance pieces by composers such as Orlando di Lasso and Palestrina. Nisini particularly draws on the concept of “diminution” and on a style called “alla bastarda” in which an original polyphonic composition is transformed into a single melodic line. (While this is a familiar style to fans of Renaissance music, for those seeking further explanation, it is probably better to go the New Grove’s Dictionary than to the somewhat confusing English translations offered in the CD liner notes.) Although many of these works would have been (and still are) performed on the viola da gamba, they were also played on the trombone; the liner notes quote Michael Praetorius on 16th century trombonists who “thanks to assiduous practice are so advanced in playing trombone” that they can play these difficult pieces.

Throughout the entire Renaissance CD, Nisini plays on a G tenor trombone (463 Hz) built by Ewald and Bernhard Meinl. This horn has a soft dark baritone sound which lends itself well to the music on the CD, in its soloistic presence, its overall blending quality, and its subtle suggestion of Renaissance difference. Although these pieces are florid and difficult, Nisini’s playing is always controlled and is presented with a kind of humility that emphasizes the interplay between trombone, crumhorn, bassoon, and percussion, and allows the other instruments and tones to shine. The challenge for the trombonist in this style of music, much like a trombonist in a jazz combo, is not just to keep up with, but also to equal the varieties of articulation that other more facile instruments can achieve. Nisini, for the most part, achieves this, even as his fellow musicians, particularly recorder player Uta Schmidt, subtly craft some complex and highly ornate lines.

Six of the fifteen tracks on the CD are Recercada from Diego Ortiz's Trattado de glosas (1553). These tracks contain some of the most melodic playing on the CD, and make excellent use of the mellow sound of Nisini’s instrument. Familiar to fans of Renaissance music, these pieces were written to be played by bowed viol over a bass melody (here played beautifully on the dulcian by Monika Fishalack). Nisini’s interpretations of the Ortiz pieces show a solid sense of phrasing, impressive legato playing, and a delicate counterpoint with keyboard, dulcian, and percussion. Long a staple of early music string players, these Ortiz Recercadas have become popular pieces recently among early music low brass players, for example Daniel Lassale on trombone or even—amazingly—Volny Hostiou in a recent recording on serpent. Nisini’s tempos are a little slower and his playing more understated than many other interpretations of these pieces, but they are musical and elegantly played. Other tracks include a lovely Bovicelli diminution on a Palestrina madrigal. In this case, the piece was written for voice, and Nisini employs his smooth legato style to create long effective melodic lines.
While much of the music on The Renaissance Trombone is familiar only to fans or players of early music, The Baroque Trombone, although it claims in the liner notes to illuminate a “dark” period of time for the trombone by “proposing a Baroque repertoire for the instrument as though the trombone had inspired these great composers” actually presents familiar music and composers, both to listeners and to trombone players. Many of these pieces—the Telemann and Marcello Sonatas, for example—are staples of the high school and undergraduate trombone player’s education, and music that most trombone players have in their library. Again, as on the Renaissance CD, Nisini’s tone and style blends and interacts well with the excellent ensemble playing. All of these pieces—sonatas, a concerto, and a ricercar—are major works of Baroque music and Nisini, bassoonist Monika Fishaleck, and harpsichordist Rebecca Maurer have just the right musical touch: light and delicate on the Allegros and just the right amount of gravitas on the Adagios.
Although Nisini’s technique is impressive, these CD’s are more significant for their musical intelligence and ensemble balance than for jaw-dropping virtuosity. And while these CDs represent an important contribution within the field of historic brass, they are also good material to present to non-musician friends who need to be convinced of the trombone’s solo potential within early music.

-- Gregory Erickson, New York University