This collection of original etudes is designed to facilitate orchestral excerpt preparation for both high and low horn auditions. Hornists with aspirations of winning an orchestral job spend hours repeatedly practicing and “running down” the same collection of standard audition passages. Students may begin practicing this repertoire for the first time as soon as high school or early university years and continue to do so throughout their musical development. As we grow as hornists, it can be a challenge to approach this repertoire so often with fresh musicality and leave behind our older, less refined playing habits. It may also be a challenge to think artistically while regularly monitoring any personal challenges we find in this repertoire—for example, the double-tongued eighth notes in the “Eroica” trio, the first measure of Ein Heldenleben, or the ascending tritone in Shostakovich’s Fifth Symphony low tutti.

These etudes can serve as new, creative outlets through which to address various musical and hornistic issues we might encounter in the orchestral literature. I have designed thorough, but fun exercises to foster the development of the specific skills our audition lists require. In conceiving of and writing these etudes, I wanted to create fresh musical pieces that would function independently from their corresponding orchestral works. Most passages enabled this compositional approach quite easily, but some, like Strauss’s Don Quixote variations and Wagner’s Prelude to Das Rheingold, required a more schematic or drill-like methodology rather than a thematic approach. In either design, each etude is intended to serve as a disguised form of its corresponding orchestral passage.

Overall, use these etudes to enhance your sense of the musical style appropriate for each orchestral passage. Use them as laboratories in which to confront any weaknesses in your playing or to experiment with new technical ideas away from the actual repertoire you will perform for an audition committee. Use them to improve your strength and endurance, in turn allowing the orchestral passages to feel free and easy to play as written. Use them, finally, to inspire your musical mind. Renew your mental and physical approach to the repertoire you have performed since you began orchestral study on the horn.