News & Events

The 2025 North American Baroque Trumpet Competition and Conference took place April 25-27, 2025, at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, New York. Hosted by Jared Wallis and Jason Dovel, the artist faculty judges included Brian Shaw and John Thiessen. Paper presenters included David Burt, Steven Coluzzi, Elisa Koehler, Noa Miller, and David Wharton. The paper session was organized by Victor Yuen. Concerts featuring the organizers and artist faculty and master classes were also held.

The artist faculty and participants of the 2025 NABTCC.

At the Fourth International Historic Brass Symposium in New York, in July 2024, the HBS presented a new award to honor the organization’s founder, Jeffrey Nussbaum. The wording of the presentation provides the details of this new award:

Congratulations to the 2025 Christopher Monk Award recipient, Don Smithers! 

Dear Fellow Member of the Historic Brass Society,

We are pleased to announce the Call for Nominations, which begins the 2025 HBS Board Election cycle. Nominations are open until October 15th, followed by online voting which will be open from November 1-30. 

On November 20-21, 2025, the Historic Brass Society, in conjunction with the Conservtoire National de Lyon, will hold an International Conference celebrating the 200th Anniversary of the births of Jean-Baptiste Arban and Julius Kosleck. It will take place at the CNSMD in Lyon, France and will include concerts, papers, lecture recitals, and round-table discussions –one focused on related organology and one on pedagogy.

We are accepting proposals, due April 15, for papers, lecture recitals and performances of up to 20 minutes, followed by 10 minutes Q & A, that relate to this anniversary, with topics including Biographical research on related figures or ensembles, Pedagogy, Repertoire, Composers, Organology, and Social Histories and Contexts. Additional details available here.

The 2024 Election Results are In!!

Our 2024 annual election has concluded. This year there were two positions open for election by the general membership. These positions were:

1. Secretary to server for the 2025-2026 term (Elected by the general membership)
2. Member of the Board of Directors to serve from 2025-2027 (Elected by the general membership
3. Elected Member of the Editorial Board to serve from 2025-2027 (Elected by members of the Editorial Board)

Secretary - Dr. Jared Wallis

The first was the position of Secretary. Joanna Hersey has been our amazing Secretary for the past four years and is stepping down at the end of this year. Replacing her is Dr. Jared Wallis for the 2025-2026 term.

The HBS Membership Secretary is a member of the Board of Directors and is responsible for assisting the Board with correspondence and member management. Dr. Jared Wallis is a versatile performer, scholar, and teaching artist specializing in the natural baroque trumpet performance and pedagogy. He has performed with The Kentucky Baroque Trumpets, Sonitus Clarissima Historical Trumpet and Kettledrums, Ensemble Perihipsous, the American Bach Choir, Mountainside Baroque, and Pegasus Early Music. Dr Wallis currently serves as Assistant Professor of Baroque Trumpet at the Eastman School of Music. He has presented research and performance at conferences for the Historic Brass Society, the National Conference for Undergraduate Research, the American Musicological Society, and the International Trumpet Guild. He has been featured as a soloist and in ensembles at the Rochester Early Music Festival, the Vintage Band Festival, and notably was awarded 1 st prize in the 2022 North American Baroque Trumpet Competition Dr. Wallis is a graduate of the Eastman School of Music where he studied modern trumpet with James Thompson and Boyde Hood, and pursued additional early music studies under the tutelage of Brian Shaw, John Thiessen, Christel Thielmann and Paul O’Dette.

Congratulations, Jared!!

Board of Directors - Robbie Collins

Members of the Board of Directors serve for three years and can then run for one additional sequential three-year term. Robbie Collins will be replacing Steven Lundahl who has served on the Board for about seven years -- he helped bring in elections and term limits since his appointment to the Board -- and is term-limited from serving as an elected member of the Board for a period of three years, as per the rewritten bylaws that he oversaw that led early in his term. As Steve is once again the Interim Treasurer, he will remain on the Board as an ex officio member until a new Treasurer is in place, though will continue to serve on the Budget and Finance committee. He is also once again taking on the role of Technical Director at the end of the year, replacing Nick Harvey who is stepping down as Technical Director but remaining on the technical team in a more limited role. Steve also serves on the Membership and Events committees so he will continue to be very active in the HBS.

Congratulations to Robbie Collins for being elected as a member of the Board of Directors for the 2025-2027 term! The HBS Board of Directors and is responsible for leadership and management of the organization and oversees events and the production of the HBS Journal.

Robbie Collins is a trumpeter originally from the Coastal Plains of North Carolina. He is an active member in the trumpet community as a performer, organizer and educator on both the regional and international level. Presently, Collins serves at North Greenville University as the Music Theory Coordinator and Director of Brass.

Collins has served on the leadership committee for the International Trumpet Guild (ITG) Emerging Professionals Division and served as the volunteer coordinator for the Historic Brass Society. He has also worked with programs such as the University of Kentucky Summer Trumpet Institute, International Trumpet Guild Conference, North American Baroque Trumpet Competition, and Gardner-Webb Trumpet Summit.

Collins has worked and performed with several world class groups and ensembles such as the the Celtic Woman group, South Carolina Philharmonic, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra’s May Festival, Lexington Philharmonic Orchestra, Knoxville Symphony Orchestra, the Chosen Vale Invitational Summer Trumpet Seminar, Saxton’s Cornet Band, and many others. Additionally, last year Collins participated as a finalist at the North American Baroque Trumpet Competition in both the solo and ensemble divisions.

His previous trumpet instructors include Jason Dovel, Alan Siebert, Gabriel DiMartino, and Tim Hudson. Collins has also participated in masterclasses led by renowned trumpet players such as Hakan Hardenberger, Edward Carrol, Clément Saunier, Chris Martin, Charles Schlueter, Josh Cohen, David Bilger, Craig Morris, Vince DiMartino, and Rex Richardson.

Editorial Board - Bryan Proksch

Bryan Proksch will be replacing Arnold Myers as the elected member of the Editorial Board. Arnold has served for many years on the Editorial Board and will continue to play an active role in our highly regarded peer-reviewed Historic Brass Journal.

Bryan Proksch is a professor of music history and 2019 Distinguished Faculty Lecturer at Lamar University. His research centers on American band history, the reception and “revival” of Haydn’s music in the early twentieth century, Viennese Classicism, and the history of the trumpet. He has written four books, including Bands in American Musical History: Inflection Points and Reappraisals (Rochester, 2024) and The Golden Age of American Bands: A History in Source Documents (1835–1935) (GIA, 2022). Bryan's essays have appeared in the Journal of the American Musicological Society and the Journal of the Historic Brass Society. He also created and edits the International Trumpet Guild Journal’s "Repertoire Corner" column and is the reviews editor for the HBSJ. He is a long-time contributor to the Historic Brass Journal as well as Historic Brass Today and is the former Web Content Editor for the Historic Brass Society.

Congratulations, Bryan!

We are sorry to announce that Historic Brass Today has ceased publication following the Spring 2024 issue. This is due to the difficulty in obtaining submissions and the fact that Helen Roberts, our wonderful Production Manager who worked hard to give HBT the highly polished and attractive look has a new position and no longer had the time to devote to HBT. We wish to thank Michael O'Connor for his excellent work as Managing Editor, Helen Roberts for her superb production work and attention to detail and style, as well as to all of the other contributors to the publication.

Historic Brass Today was conceived as a bridge between our esteemed annual scholarly Historic Brass Journal and our website to offer informative, yet lighter articles, as well as interviews, reviews, news and event information, and to offer our members additional opportunities to be involved in the HBS and to achieve recognition. While not planned as a "pandemic publication", it became more difficult to obtain submissions after 2021 as members were busy reestablishing their musical lives.

We are very proud of the work that Mike, Helen and the many contributors produced, and hope that at some point we may be able to resume publication. For now, however, we must focus our efforts elsewhere. We have opened the publication up to the public, removing it from our paywall.

Thanks again, to everyone that made Historic Brass Today the high quality publication it became!

Steven Lundahl and the entire Executive team

Make plans to see some of the wonderful events at this year's symposium!

The Historic Brass Society is happy to welcome our new Interim General Manager to the team. A performer and musical instrument industry specialist, Ann Carroll Bundy is a freelance artist and educator in the Boston area. A veteran of the United States Coast Guard, Ann served as Principal Flute in the U.S.C.G. Band, touring internationally, performing for Presidential inaugurations, in ceremonial work for heads of state, and as a member of the U.S.C.G. Woodwind Quintet.

Mississippi University for Women in Columbus, Mississippi hosted the 7th annual Music by Women Festival in March 2024. Held in Kossen Auditorium in the historic Poindexter Music Hall, built in 1905 and home to the Department of Music, this festival featured three days of performances and lectures. The material presented included one common factor, all research centered gender studies, and all of the pieces performed were by female composers.