Members are reminded that nominations for the next Christopher Monk Award should be received by the Chairman of the Christopher Monk Award Committee by February 1, 2020. Details of the award and the processes attached to it can be found under the ‘Awards’ tab of this site.
As the organization continues to grow and evolve, we are reaching out to members - present, past and potential - and to colleagues in the brass performance, research, instrument making and collecting community to ask for your input in shaping the future of HBS. We’d be grateful for ten to fifteen minutes of your time to complete the survey in the link below. It addresses HBS governance structure and terms, the HBS Journal, website and newsletter.
To make sure your voice is heard, please complete the survey by 10 February.
Please feel free to share the link to this survey and this email with any colleagues or friends whom you think might be interested. We want to hear from as many people who are interested in the history of brass instruments, brass literature, performance practice, etc. as possible, not just current and former members.
On behalf of the Board of the Historic Brass Society, many thanks for your help and all best wishes for the New Year.
Historic Brass Society Board Members:
Alexander Bonus
Stewart Carter
Jason Dovel
Sabine Klaus
Steven Lundahl
Arnold Myers
Jeffrey Nussbaum
Bradley Strauchen
Update 2/25/20: There are only 5 open spots left at the Barclay trumpet-building course. Further information and registration can be obtained at the Cambridge Woodwind Makers website.
The 2020 edition of the trumpet-building course taught by Bob Barclay will again take place in Cambridge, UK, on July 4-8. As always, participants will make a reproduction of a 1632 natural trumpet by Hainlein. Further information on this educational (and fun) experience is available at the Cambridge Woodwind Makers website.
It is with great sadness that we inform the HBS membership of the unexpected passing on July 11, 2019, of Dr. Joella F. Utley, wife of the late Dr. Joe Roy Utley (1935–2001).
On June 12, 2019, Metropolitan Museum musical instrument curators Bradley Strauchen and Herbert Heyde were joined by trumpeter Frank Hosticka, saxophonist Paul Cohen, and HBS President Jeff Nussbaum on an excursion to view Scott Robinson’s eclectic instrument collection housed in every nook and cranny of his home in New Jersey.
Making the Jazz Gumbo: An International Conference on Repertoires that Influenced and were Influenced by Early Jazz
Marking the 100th Anniversary of the death of James Reese Europe
Presented by the Historic Brass Society, with support from the City University Of New York Graduate Center
May 8, 2019
CUNY Graduate Center, NYC
Jimmy Owens and Bobby Sanabria – Co-Musical Directors
Jeff Nussbaum and John Graziano – Co-Conference Directors
Scholars and Performers to include: Jason Moran, Ehud Asherie, Frederick Starr, Jack Stewart, Michael Dinwiddle, Ned Sublette, Krin Gabbard, Ralph Barrett, Graham Haynes, Paul Niemisto, Thomas Garcia, Laura Moore Pruett + 20 Piece Period-Instrument Band.
The 2019 Early Brass Festival of the Historic Brass Society (HBS) will be held in conjunction with Vintage Band Festival in Northfield, Minnesota. The Early Brass Festival will take place August 2-4, 2019, primarily at the Weitz Center for Creativity on the campus of Carleton College in Northfield.
In addition to a membership meeting and musical performances by attendees, the HBS gathering will feature more than a dozen scholarly presentations on variety of topics. The complete schedule for the three-day event follows. To register, download the Early Brass Festival registration form.
Once again the Cambridge Woodwind Makers will be offering summer workshops in which participants get to build their own instruments (cornetto and/or natural trumpet). The Natural Trumpet workshop led by Bob Barclay and Richard Seraphinoff will be held June 24-28, 2019. For more information click here. Sam Goble and Andrew Hallock will lead the Cornetto workshop, held August 26-30, 2019, click here for further information. Participants in either course do not need to have prior experience in metal/woodworking, and you walk away with a playable instrument!
The research team project “Our music, our world: Musical associations, wind bands, and local communities (1880-2018)” is pleased to invite submissions of proposals for the International conference Our music, our world: wind bands and local social life, to be held in Aveiro, at the Departamento de Comunicação e Arte da Universidade de Aveiro, from the 10th to 12th of October 2019. The proposal deadline is March 30, 2019. Details on the conference and submission process are available on the conference website: https://anossamusica.web.ua.pt/conferencia.php
Vic Hobson just did an interview with Jazz on the Tube about his latest book on Louis Armstrong that many members might be interested in (it also mentions our upcoming conference on Jazz in the early 20th century!). https://www.jazzonthetube.com/vic-hobson-and-the-roots-of-louis-armstrongs-music/
The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Brass Instruments which has been described as the most important publication on brass instruments since 1976 (Anthony Baines's Brass Instruments) has now been published in hardback.
The 600 page book is edited by Trevor Herbert, Arnold Myers and John Wallace.
Thirty-two experts from fifteen countries join three of the world’s leading authorities on the design, manufacture, performance and history of brass musical instruments in this first major encyclopedia on the subject. It includes over 100 illustrations, and gives attention to every known brass instrument which has been regularly used, with information about the way they are played, the uses to which they have been put and the importance they have had in classical music, sacred rituals, popular music, jazz, brass bands and the bands of the military. There are specialist entries covering every inhabited region of the globe and essays on the methods that experts have used to study and understand brass instruments. The encyclopedia spans the entire period from antiquity to modern times, with new and unfamiliar material that takes advantage of the latest research. From Abblasen to Zorzi Trombetta da Modon, this is the definitive guide for students, academics, musicians and music lovers.
Members of the Historic Brass Society can buy a copy at a discounted price from http://www.thewallacecollectionshop.world, by using the special coupon code of HBS2018CEBI at the checkout. This will provide a saving of more than 15% off the normal RRP.
