2023 NORTHWEST ALPHORN WORKSHOP

    Tony Brazelton is a professional trumpet and alphorn player, as well as an instructor with more than 40 years of experience in musical performance. His musical career has taken him across the United States and Europe. Tony is the founder of the very popular Salzburger Echo, as well as the North American Alphorn Retreat.  

Salzburger Echo brings the music of the Alps to their audi­ences, playing Old World and Contemporary Folk music from the alpine regions of Germany, Austria, and Switzer­land. The band regularly plays some of the largest Oktoberfests in the nation and has performed at hundreds of elementary schools across the nation to help teach children about the origin of the music and about the music itself.

Tony was the third place finisher at the 2008 international alphorn competition in Nendaz, Switzerland. In 2010 he and Brian Priebe placed second with their duet, and Tony also placed fifth in the solo competition in Nendaz, Switzerland.

Education: Bachelor of Music (teaching) University of Wyoming, Master of Music (performance) University of Nevada Reno

salzburgerecho@comcast.net

www.salzburgerecho.com 

  Dr. Natalie Douglass Grana is a hornist and educator based in Chicago, Illinois. Her integrative approach to teaching horn through singing and inner hearing has garnered international recognition, and she has worked with hundreds of students to develop fluency as hornists and complete musicians.

Dr. Grana is currently on faculty at Lake Forest College and DePaul University in Chicago and previously served as Assistant Professor of Horn and head of brass at Utah Valley University in Orem, UT. Dr. Grana has become an authority on inner hearing and solfege training, and specializes in transferring these skills to horn performance. Her pedagogy and teaching philosophies are greatly inspired by Zoltan Kodály, and she spent the 2015-2016 academic year on a U.S. Fulbright Grant to the Kodály Institute of the Liszt Academy of Music in Kecskemét, Hungary. She has appeared at numerous International Horn Society Symposia and regional horn workshops, has been a keynote speaker and clinician for NAfME, and has served as a visiting academic at Oxford University in Oxford, UK. Her masterclasses are in demand for hornists, brass players, and music educators alike, and she has been a guest artist at some of the world’s finest musical institutions, including the Royal Conservatoire of the Hague (The Hague, Netherlands), the Royal Academy of Music (London, UK), the San Francisco Conservatory (San Francisco, CA), and the New England Conservatory (Boston, MA). She has taught horn and led the musicianship curriculum at the renowned Kendall Betts Horn Camp since 2013. Her book, “A Singing Approach to Horn Playing,” is forthcoming from Oxford University Press.

As an orchestral musician, she has performed with the Quad Cities Symphony, Heartland Festival Orchestra, Utah Symphony, Louisville Symphony, Kentucky Symphony, and Illinois Symphony. She has played in backup ensembles for musicians like Josh Groban, Idina Menzel, and Mannheim Steamroller. While in Utah, she also recorded musical soundtracks, video game music, and film scores for various recording studios in Salt Lake City. She has toured under the batons of Lorin Maazel and Krzysztof Penderecki and performed in venues across Germany, Austria, Poland, France, the Netherlands, Hungary, and Oman.

Dr. Grana holds a D.M.A. in Horn Performance from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music and an MM in Horn Performance and BME in Instrumental Music Education from the University of Illinois in Urbana-Champaign. Her principal teachers include Randy Gardner, Bernhard Scully, Thomas Jostlein, and Kazimerz Machala. She studied solfege and voice under Agnes Gerges-Gal and Renata Darazs of the Liszt Academy of Music, Hungary.

  William G. Rose is Associate Professor of Music at McNeese State University in Lake Charles, LA, teaching low brass and music theory. He directs the McNeese State University Alphorn Ensemble, a unique, one-of-a-kind university ensemble, which maintains an active performing schedule in Southwest Louisiana.

He performs as principal trombonist with the Lake Charles Symphony (Lake Charles, LA) and Rapides Symphony Orchestra (Alexandria, LA), as well has having performed as principal trombonist of the Milwaukee Civic Orchestra, the Concordia Chamber Orchestra, Music Under the Stars, bass trombone with the Detroit Chamber Winds, substitute bass and tenor trombone with the Milwaukee Symphony, principal trombone with the Shreveport Symphony and principal and bass trombone with the Acadiana Symphony Orchestra. He participated in the alphorn competition at the Festival International des Cor de Alps in Nendaz, Switzerland in 2017 and 2022; and in 2022, had two compositions for solo alphorn performed (including the solo “A Gentle Jodel,” premiered by fellow alphorn artist Dr. Natalie Grana!).

As a published composer and arranger, his catalog includes works for band, orchestra, jazz ensemble, choir, handbells, brass ensemble and alphorn solo and ensemble compositions. Five of his original alphorn works have been performed/premiered at International Horn Society Workshops: in 2013 (Memphis, TN), at Ball State (Muncie, IN) in 2019, and in 2022 at Texas A&M (Kingsville, TX). Mr. Rose is a founding member of the LATEX Trombone Quartet; has served as an instructor for the Midwest Alphorn Retreat and the NorthWest Alphorn Workshop; and is a Yamaha Performing Artist.

  Organizer of the North American Alphorn Retreat, freelance Alphorn Player, Composer, Vocalist, Yodeler, and Manager of Logistics and Communication for Salzburger Echo

Robert Brazelton has been performing alphorn since the summer of 2003. Robert was the first American to compete in the International Alphorn Festival (Nendaz, Switzerland), and has tallied two top-ten finishes. Having taken up the alphorn at a young age, Robert has been interviewed for, and featured in several television programs that ran across Europe and North America. Robert performed an alphorn solo for the Utah State High School Solo/Ensemble Festival in 2009 and received a superior rating. This is believed to be the first time that the alphorn was used in a State Solo Festival in the United States. Robert was also featured as one of 10 soloists during Skyline High Schools 2009 senior recital, where he performed a concerto arrangement of Hans-Jürg Sommer’s “Am Holzerwäg" on alphorn. 

In recent years, Robert has taken over as one of the featured singers and yodelers of the Salzburger Echo Band, and has been touring the western U.S. and performing at some of the largest Oktoberfests and European Heritage Festivals in America. Outside of his role in Salzburger Echo, he is also a composer and freelance alphorn player. 

Robert is the main organizer and manager of the North American Alphorn Retreat.

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info@alphornretreat.com