Sabine Klaus reports that there is an official recording of the 2007 Early Brass Festival available. It is available for $US 5.00 per CD. The access money (after making the CDs and shipping them) will go to the Joe Utley Student Travel Award Line Item. To order, contact Sabine Klaus at sabine.klaus@att.net

The Julliard School of Music will be hosting a series of masterclasses and chamber music playing sessions offered by the pre-college faculty on March 1, 2008, commencing at 1:00pm. Faculty include Per Brevig, trombone; Julie Landman, horn; and Raymond Mase, trumpet. For more information or to RSVP contact pcbrassday@julliard.edu.

Keith Rogers, cornett, serpent and oboe maker at Christopher Monk Instruments (CMI), died on the 21st January after a lengthy struggle with pancreatic cancer.

Following a career in teaching, which culminated in the positions of Director of Music at two leading Northern Ireland grammar schools, as well as spending several years as a recorder maker, Keith joined the Christopher Monk workshops in April 1992. Here, in partnership with the cornett player Jeremy West, and succeeding the late Christopher Monk (founding father of the cornett and serpent revivals), Keith spent the remainder of his life making copies of historic wind instruments. Building on his skills and experience as a recorder maker, he quickly adapted to the demands made by “all instruments that wiggle” (as they are affectionately known at CMI); instruments which are demanding on both player and maker alike. Using the treasure trove of clues and evidence extant in Christopher Monk’s own workshop, Keith picked his way through this mysterious and vexing labyrinth. But it was his unique mix of powerful intellect and enviable manual dexterity that enabled him so successfully to create fabulous wind instruments. Examples of his work live (and play) on and may be found across the world from New York to New Zealand, Aberdeen to Argentina.

An experiment to make an oboe da caccia using the same methods employed to manufacture a serpent, lead to a lasting partnership with leading oboe player and authority, Dick Earle. A da caccia (eventually built in the traditional way rather than using the method above), along with several models of historic oboe, became available as a result. For more than a decade these beautiful instruments have been sent to appreciative players from five continents.

Keith Rogers was born and brought up in Sussex; he studied music at the University of Wales at Bangor (BA Honors 1st Class 1965), lived in Belfast, then in London and, most recently, in rural Norfolk. He is survived by his wife, Kathryn, four daughters and six grandchildren.

--Jeremy West

One of the pioneers of historic brass research and recipient of the HBS Monk Award, Mary Rasmussen died on January 26. Her articles in the Brass Quarterly and A teacher's Guide to the Literature of Brass Instruments sparked the interests of those who launched the historic brass movement.

I only met Mary once. It was at the 1998 Early Brass Festival where she was awarded the Christopher Monk Award for her exemplary scholarship in historic brass. I found her to be a warm and vital woman who was genuinely honored by the event.

Her colleague, Prof. Mark DeVoto has kindly agreed to let us publish his remembrance of Prof. Rasmussen

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With sorrow I inform our fellowship of the death of Mary Helen Rasmussen, Professor emerita of Music at the University of New Hampshire, on 26 January in Durham, New Hampshire. She was 77 years old and had suffered from cancer, intermittently but eventually finally, since the early 1970s.

Mary was a splendid colleague and a treasured friend of many of us, a "true polymath," as the minute on her retirement described her in 1997. We knew her as a self-taught musicologist of remarkable ability and accomplishment and amazing versatility, skilled in many areas of music-making and a tireless researcher in a wide variety of areas. She graduated from the University of New Hampshire with a bachelor's degree in 1952 and then went to the University of Illinois, receiving a Master of Music in low brass performance in 1953 and a Master of Library Science in 1956. For two years, she taught public school in Gorham, New Hampshire, and was always proud that of all the music faculty at UNH, where she was appointed in 1968, she was the only member to have actually taught in the New Hampshire school system.

That Mary never received a doctorate was of no consequence to her productivity and learning. She was the recipient of a Fulbright award and grants from the Ford and Guggenheim foundations. She was a regular contributor to the CMS and to AMS meetings locally and nationally, and lectured at many different institutions, including Harvard, Boston University, and the University of Wisconsin. On the UNH faculty she taught several historical courses but also directed the string methods program, finding time to become a decent cellist who performed regularly, and achieved a statewide renown as a skilled repairer of stringed instruments.

Mary published articles and reviews in a number of different journals, but also became her own publisher. She founded Brass Quarterly in 1957, merging it soon with Woodwind Quarterly, and the combined journal continued until 1969. From the 1970s she became increasingly active in the field of musical iconography and collected photographs from all over the world. Her magnum opus, Musical Subjects in Western European Art, was the focus of more than two decades of effort, but it remains unfinished.

A memorial service for Mary is in the planning stage, to occur sometime in the spring.

--Mark DeVoto formerly Associate Professor of Music and the Humanities, the University of New Hampshire, 1968-1981

Trumpeter Jean-François Madeuf sends us news of his many activities. He writes, “Things are going well for the revival of the real baroque trumpet (without holes). More and more players are interested in playing in this way because they hear that it is possible now to play safely, in tune and musically, and all with authentic instruments and performance techniques. So many students are coming each year in Basel and Lyon and I obtain the same results, in a shorter time, than a few years ago. It is like they don't have the mental limitations that we have traditionally in the brass family. I am very busy and have concerts not only in France but throughout Europe and occasionally in Japan. It seems that things are changing in Germany and the UK where it is now possible to play without holes, thanks to people who studied in Basel in recent years. Makers such as Graham Nicholson (Den Haag) or Markus Raquet (Bamberg) are producing fine instruments and have full list of orders.

I performed the 2nd Brandenburg twelve times in concert in 2007 (8 times connected with the 1st Brandenburg on horn and ensemble La Petite Bande with Sigiswald Kuijken). We know that this very difficult piece is playable like it was done in the past on a natural instrument with an appropriate and historically accurate mouthpiece. I recorded it last August for a little label. I will play it again in 2008 in France and Japan and perhaps record it again. In 2009 a tour is planned with La Petite Bande as well as a recording. Another important project will be the tour of French ensemble Le Concert Spirituel in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Japan the following October, performing the Handel Water Music and Royal Fireworks. This ensemble recorded these works with 9 natural trumpets and 9 natural horns.

On 19th-century music for period instruments great progress is also being made. I participated recently in a project performing and recording the Dvorak 9th Symphony and Schumann's Konzertstück for 4 horns and orchestra. David Guerrier played a Viennese pump system horn (1st) with Antoine Dreyfus (2nd) Emmanuel Padieu (3rd) and René Schirer (4th). The orchestra was La Chambre Philharmonique conducted by Emmanuel Krivine. With Les Cuivres Romantiques, we continue the exploration of 19th-century brass band repertoire. Patrick Fraize (Bourges) made for us very good 19th-century natural trumpets with crooks after Raoux (1800-1830).”

Trumpeter and instrument maker Graham Nicholson has recently developed a classical trumpet after a 1794 Viennese Huschauer. He reports that there is only one left in the world and it is housed in the Edinburgh Colelction of Historic Instruments. He says that it is sublime as a classical trumpet, there is nothing that comes close to it. The bore is 12.2mm which is a lot bigger than the baroque bores. As a 3 holed trumpet it has the advantage of the other models that it does not go flat in the bottom and sharp in the top range as you add crooks. Contact: graham.nicholson@inter.nl.net

The September 18th issue of the New York Times ran a news story about two small guilded horns with a remarkable history. A pair of gilded horns which were reproductions of the fifth-century originals stolen 205 years ago and melted down by a debt-ridden watchmaker and goldsmith, were stolen from the Jelling Museum in South Jutland, Denmark. They were on loan from the Danish National Museum. Two days later the Times ran another story with a happy ending. The horns were recovered by the Danish police and the gang of bad-guys were arrested!