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| Historic Brass Society | |
|---|---|
| Name | Historic Brass Society |
| Type | Nonprofit organization |
| Founded | 1988 |
| Founder | Roy Marks |
| Headquarters | New York City |
| Fields | Brass instruments, music history, performance practice |
Historic Brass Society is an international learned society dedicated to the study, performance, preservation, and dissemination of knowledge about brass instruments and brass playing from historical perspectives. The Society brings together scholars, performers, instrument makers, curators, and collectors engaged with topics ranging from Renaissance cornett and sackbut to nineteenth‑century valve trombone, twentieth‑century trumpet, and contemporary historical reconstruction. Its activities link research institutions, museums, conservatories, and festivals across Europe, North America, Australasia, and beyond.
The Society was founded in 1988 by a group including Roy Marks and other figures drawn from the communities around International Trumpet Guild, Royal College of Music, and Metropolitan Museum of Art collections. Early meetings connected researchers associated with Royal Conservatory of The Hague, Indiana University Bloomington, and Guildhall School of Music and Drama. Throughout the 1990s the Society cultivated ties to institutions such as Smithsonian Institution, University of Oxford, Boston Early Music Festival, and Royal Conservatory of Music (Toronto), while fostering international scholarship illustrated by collaborations with Répertoire International des Sources Musicales projects and conferences at Royal Musical Association venues. Key personalities in its formative decades included instrument historians linked to the Musical Instrument Museums Online network and curators from the Berlin State Museums and V&A Museum.
In the early 2000s the Society expanded its reach through partnerships with academic journals and with archives at Bibliothèque nationale de France, British Library, and Library of Congress. Conferences have been held in cities like New York City, Oxford, Paris, Prague, and Melbourne, reflecting engagement with both European and Australasian research traditions. Over time the Society established a formal editorial board with scholars affiliated with Harvard University, University of Cambridge, University of California, Berkeley, and Yale University.
The Society’s mission centers on promoting rigorous historical and performance research concerning brass instruments and their repertories. It supports interdisciplinary dialogue among staff from Royal College of Music, performers from ensembles such as English Concert and Academy of Ancient Music, curators at Horniman Museum and Gardens, and luthiers from workshops associated with the Gonser family tradition. Core activities include organizing scholarly conferences, producing peer‑reviewed publications, facilitating instrument conservation projects with institutions like the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and advising museum exhibitions at venues including the Royal Academy of Music and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The Society also promotes historically informed performance through workshops, masterclasses, and collaborations with ensembles and conservatories including Guildhall School of Music and Drama, Royal Academy of Music (London), and Curtis Institute of Music. Its outreach connects collectors and curators involved with collections at the Musée de la Musique, Paris and the Boston Museum of Fine Arts.
The Society publishes the peer‑reviewed Historic Brass Society Journal, edited by scholars affiliated with King’s College London, University of Cambridge, Yale University, and Indiana University Bloomington. The Journal features articles on instrument construction, iconography, repertory, and source studies, drawing on primary materials from archives such as the Archivio di Stato di Venezia, the Hofbibliothek Wien, and the Bodleian Libraries. Edited collections and conference proceedings have been issued in collaboration with university presses including Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, and University of Illinois Press.
Monographs by Society members have addressed figures and repertories connected to Girolamo Fantini, Giovanni Gabrieli, Heinrich Schütz, Giuseppe Verdi, Richard Wagner, and John Philip Sousa, while technical studies have documented instrument makers like the Adolphe Sax tradition, the Boosey & Hawkes archives, and Viennese workshops associated with the Stölzel family. Reviews and bibliographies in the Journal frequently cite holdings from the British Museum, the Stadtmuseum München, and the Royal Danish Library.
Biennial and annual meetings convene at academic and museum sites including Harvard University, University of Melbourne, Conservatorio di Musica Santa Cecilia, and regional festivals such as the Oregon Bach Festival and the Augsburg Mozart Festival. Conferences combine paper sessions, instrument displays drawn from collections at Musée de la Musique, Paris and Royal College of Music archives, and performances by ensembles like Tafelmusik and Les Arts Florissants. Recent symposia have addressed topics such as early brass acoustics, military band histories linked to Napoleonic Wars repertoire, and nineteenth‑century brass pedagogy tied to conservatory curricula at Conservatoire de Paris.
Workshops and masterclasses bring together specialists from Conservatorium van Amsterdam, Royal Conservatory of The Hague, and makers associated with the Wagner family of instrument builders, offering hands‑on study of cornetto, serpent, keyed trumpet, and valved instruments.
Membership includes individual scholars, institutional subscribers, museum professionals, and student members from institutions such as Juilliard School, Royal Academy of Music (London), and McGill University. The Society is governed by an elected council with officers often drawn from faculties at University of Oxford, Eastman School of Music, University of Toronto, and University of North Texas. Committees oversee editorial work, conference planning, and preservation initiatives coordinated with the International Council of Museums and university departments.
Membership benefits include access to the Journal, reduced conference fees, and participation in curated study days hosted by museums like the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Cité de la Musique.
The Society honors outstanding scholarship and service with prizes and recognition often named after prominent figures in the field. Awardees have included researchers affiliated with University of Cambridge, Indiana University Bloomington, Royal College of Music, and performers connected to English National Opera and Los Angeles Philharmonic. Awards recognize contributions to instrument conservation, dissertation research, and lifetime achievement in historical brass studies, and are presented at conference banquets often held in partnership with institutions such as the Royal Academy of Music.
The Society maintains relationships with major instrument collections and archives, facilitating research at institutions including the Musée de la Musique, Paris, the Berlin State Museums, the Staatliches Institut für Musikforschung, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Horniman Museum and Gardens. Members frequently consult archival materials at the British Library, the Bibliothèque nationale de France, the Archivio di Stato di Venezia, and the Library of Congress for manuscript parts, iconographic sources, and maker’s records. Conservation collaborations have produced technical studies referencing holdings at Smithsonian Institution, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and university collections at Indiana University Bloomington and University of Cambridge.
Category:Music organizations Category:Brass instruments