sounds that get under your skin
Contributions around the alphorn.
The complex tones used in Swiss ethnic music correspond to the harmonic sequence of waveguide resonance modes. These musical tones turn out to be a discrete logarithmic curve. The mapping of them onto positive integers produces a different way of counting scales as is usually used in western music.
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Play-Alongs are very popular with alphorn players. Many scores are now available in electronic formats, and with the free software Musescore, rendering to audio is no problem. Here is a step-by-step guide for the technically inexperienced.
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Alphorn playing is sometimes described in history as “blown yodeling”, as “yodeling on the instrument”, or as “yodeling on the alphorn”. What is meant by this? On the occasion of the publication the English translation of the book “Alpenstimmung” (“Alpine Vibes”), Yannick Wey and Andrea Kammermann comment on this question.
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Brandi and Lindsey Jones are, to my knowledge, the only alphorn making couple in the world. They have known each other since their school days. Musically, they went the way of the trombone to the French horn as an inseparable duo. Lindsey graduated early and dedicated himself to restoring brass instruments with his Nevada-based business, Silver & Brass Musical Instruments, beginning in 2013. Brandi joined the business full time when it began generating enough sales to cover the young couple’s
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The first months on the alphorn are for beginners mainly a struggle with the lips. After just a few minutes of playing the alphorn, the muscles go slack – then it just croaks, high notes no longer come and the lips hurt. The usual advice is “be patient, it will come in time, just don’t push it…”. That may be. But isn’t there a shortcut? What was that again about bodybuilding for the lips? If you do some research on
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The alphorn presents such a unique, timeless beauty in its natural production of the overtone series; a sound that captivates with its resonance and simplicity. However, the absence of any kind of keys or valves means that they player is entirely responsible for vividly hearing the correct pitch before playing it. Unlike a piano or a fretted guitar string, the alphorn will never inform the player what the correct pitch is. For this reason, it requires a very clear musical
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For an article by Robert Scotton on the same topic (in French), see here. The question here is, “How do I find the alphorn mouthpiece that best suits me and my alphorn?” This is not a topic for beginners! At the beginning of the alphorn career, the mouthpiece feels unfamiliar, and there is a lack of reference to classify subjective impressions. For the first few years, you should therefore refrain from experimenting. Better to settle on an “average” mouthpiece from
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Simon Keller has been playing the alphorn for seven years. During this time, he happened to come across a picture of an Alpine sax on the Internet and was immediately fascinated. Soon he set about building his own instrument. He drew plans, a colleague helped him program the CNC files, and Roland Zahner milled the blanks. As a trained toolmaker, Simon took over the finish. After 120 hours of work, Model 1.0 was ready. Disillusionment followed: the instrument did not
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Anton “Toni” von Gunten began his musical career in early childhood. From the violin he moved on to the clarinet and brass band. He graduated in wind band conducting, later working as a clarinet and saxophone teacher. Besides, he always dealt with wood; he built original“urchrummi” furniture during several years. He owes his entry into the alphorn to the reputation of alphorn maker Tobias Bärtschi, whom he had known since recruit school in the army band – the brass band
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Since 1975 the ISO standard 16-1975 is valid (here you can buy it for 40 CHF). It sets the concert pitch a1 at a frequency of 440Hz. As early as 1939, this tuning was agreed upon at a conference in London and endorsed as a recommendation by the ISO in 1955. With its adoption as a standard, unification was sealed, promoting musical exchange, trade of musical instruments and audio equipment. Already in the 1980s some people rejected the standard and
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