The Ninth Annual Maryland Early Brass Festival

Release date: March 07, 2008 |

Goucher College will host the Ninth Annual Maryland Brass Festival on Saturday, April 5, from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.

The daylong festival features an array of free public events that celebrate early brass instruments. Attendees who are unfamiliar with these historic instruments will get a chance to learn more, and aficionados will have the opportunity to network, practice, and perform. A full schedule of events is available online at www.goucher.edu/earlybrass, but as always, the festival highlight will be a free public concert in the Haebler Memorial Chapel at 7 p.m.

This year, the concert will feature performances by the Maryland Early Brass Consort; the U.S. Army Old Guard Fife and Drum Corps; natural hornist Paul Hopkins; and the artist-in-residence, Stanley Curtis.

Curtis is a nationally known performer of the Baroque trumpet, modern cornets and trumpets, and 19th-century cornets and trumpets. He is a member of the United States Navy Band and performs regularly with the USNB Brass Quartet. He founded and leads the Washington Baroque trumpet ensemble "Battaglia."

Curtis will also host a workshop discussing the differences in playing trumpets and cornets dating from the Renaissance to the present day.

Michael Holmes, a conductor and French hornist, will give the festival’s keynote lecture on "Tuning and Temperament" at 1 p.m. in Merrick Lecture Hall. In his talk, Holmes will examine historic pitch standards and temperaments.

The festival is sponsored by the Elizabeth B. and David Allen Robertson Lectureship Fund.