Cottonwood Canyons: Solitude Mountain Resort will be the site of the 3rd Annual North American Alphorn Retreat August 15, 2010

Solitude Mountain Resort will be the site of the 3rd Annual North American Alphorn Retreat this coming August 12th through the 15th. Come for a wonderfully unique concert on Sunday afternoon at 1:00pm.

The Alphorn is not just a Swiss folk-musical instrument, it is the Swiss national instrument.

The shape of the curved alphorn is a gift from nature:

A young pine-tree, which has grown curved under the pressure of the snow on a hill-side, is felled, the bark is removed and the tree is cut into two halves. Today's alphorn makers prefer to this natural form wood of a better quality, which they glue together and carve afterwards in the shape of an alphorn . The hollowed-out pieces are stuck together and held in place with several wooden rings. A small wooden foot in the bend allows the alphorn to be rested on the ground. Afterwards, the alphorns are bound with rattan, but formerly other materials were used: string, wire, strips of linen soaked in pitch, willow shoots, metal rings, bone, strips of wood, cherry and birch bark trees. The bark of the birch-tree is still used to wind round the "Büchel".

In early summer, when the sap rises, "Büchel-maker" Imhof in Muotathal climbs a birch-tree and detaches long strips of bark, which he winds directly round the instrument. To make an alphorn is a feat of patience, but to make a "Büchel" is an industrial art. As a tube of wood can't be curved like a tube of brass, the "Büchel" has to be composed of three pieces, halved, hollowed-out and stuck together.

When we watch alphorn-makers in their old-fashioned workshops handling traditional tools, when we look at museum pieces, we get the feeling that alphorn-shapes and alphorn making have not changed for centuries. The traditional 11 feet long alphorn was composed of two slightly curved blocks of wood, hollowed and bound together by wiflow shoots.
The different shapes of the Swiss alphorn are represented by specimens in museums and private collections. Best known is the classical shape of the Swiss alphorn: a long conical tube, curved at the end like a knee. As a hobby instrument this kind of wooden trumpet is now spread over the whole of Switzerland. Formerly it was familiar only in the canton of Appenzell, in the Bernese Oberland and in the central part of Switzerland. The so-called "herdsman's horn" is shorter and slightly curved.

It is obsolescent, but was played in every alpine region of Switzerland at one time. The straight, conical type - about 4 feet long - was constructed alongside the curved herdsman's horn. It is the typical shape of the Rhine Valley in the canton of the Grisons. The herdsmen of this valley played the "Tiba" until 1930.

This hom was often made of sheet metal. The straight, slightly conical and elegant shape is called "Stockbüchel". This instrument has become rare. The last was built by a carpenter in the canton of Schwyz 20 surrounding Lake Lucerne . The "Büchel" has a higher pitch than the classical alphorn, because it is shorter.
At one time every herdsman used to make his alphorn himself. In the last century carpenters in the central part of Switzerland started to manufacture alphons, and today there are about 40 alphom-makers working in Switzerland. Most of them - farmers and carpenters - make alphorns as a side-line.

Come on up to Solitude Ski Resort on August 15, 2010 for a wonderful concert and an opportunity to see many different types of ALPhorns.

PS: if you love the cottonwoods, snowbird, solitude, alta, brighton, I am selling a home at the mouth of Little Cottonwood-open house on Aug 21st from 3:00-5:00pm Villa Details @ http://bit.ly/d4HQlG