Mr. Smith, With all due respect (and I do have enormous respect for hard working, underpaid, often unappreciated middle/high school band directors), I started on the Horn in 4th grade and was neither confused nor frustrated. This year, my 11 year old son has started the Horn (in F) and is neither confused nor frustrated. All the horn players I have played with up until a couple years ago had started on the Horn. Of course, no one told me that the horn was too hard for me to play. I guess that wasn't part of the pedagogical repertoire back in those days.
It was certainly not my intention to imply that all beginning hornists were confused or frustrated. I am sorry if you took it as such. The thread I addressed was regarding the Bb or F single horn for youngsters. I meant to suggest that the argument was less important if the students had previous experience on other instruments.
In cases where students have had previous musical experience (including piano, violin, ect), the opportunity for private instruction, and/or class instruction in a classroom with only horn players, beginning hornists will usually progress more consistently and reliably. Then we all know of (and maybe consider ourselves to be) those remarkable students who seem to succeed regardless of the obstacles in their path. It seems there is no stopping the student who really wants to play horn and I don't believe a teacher should try.
In my youth, I considered it almost sacrilege to begin a student on a wind instrument other than horn (even though I played piano, violin, euphonium and ((gsasp)) accordion before learning horn). After years of teaching, I have found that success is worth more than purity and that is the rationale behind my opinion.
Incidentally, I do not recommend switching from trumpet to horn (a very normal route) because of difficulty in adjusting embouchure and tonal concepts. Nevertheless, many very successful hornists began as trumpet players.
Lastly, may I say that I have never told any student that the instrument (or any other) was too hard. I do my best not to give students reasons, expectations, or excuses for failure.
Richard Smith R.G.Smith Music Engraving & Publishing <http://rgsmithmusic.com/>rgsmithmusic.<http://rgsmithmusic.com/>com [EMAIL PROTECTED] _______________________________________________ post: [EMAIL PROTECTED] set your options at http://music.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/archive%40jab.org
