The Ninth Annual Meeting of the IDRS, held at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland from August 12 to 15, 1980, was a milestone in the history of the Society -- not only because it was the first meeting to be held outside North America. There were so many unique and exciting events related to the bassoon that only those considered of the greatest significance will be dealt with here. Anyone desiring a complete program should be able to obtain one from the society's librarian.
Before the official opening of the meeting, on the morning of Tuesday, August 12, William Waterhouse of London, England gave a brief introductory talk about the articles from his bassoon collection which were beautifully displayed in the adjacent museum of the University. The talk was necessarily brief as Mr. Waterhouse had prepared in advance a leaflet entitled "FOUR CENTURIES OF BASSOON" which excellently describes each of the seventy-four articles which made up the display. Copies of this leaflet should be available from Mr. Waterhouse himself, if not from the Society's librarian. The exhibit was open every afternoon and Mr. Waterhouse was available to answer all questions.
The exhibit included eighteen bassoons by English, French and German makers (including Heckel) dating from the early eighteenth century to the early twentieth century plus a Boehm system instrument, as well as two nineteenth century tenoroons (which were later played in concert by William Waterhouse and Gunter Angerhöfer of Leipzig, DDR.) and an English contrabassoon of the late nineteenth century. Also displayed were sixteen pictures of bassoons and bassoonists including a photo of W. H. Heckel taken in 1945 and posing with his grand-daughter and Lawrence Intravala and another photo of the distinguished reedmaker Kurt Ludwig. The fifteen manuscripts on display included a xerox of the original manuscript of Telemann's "SONATA IN F MINOR" (Hamburg, 1728), one of the two surviving copies of the "VI SONATE PER FAGOTO" (London, c. 1735) of L. Merci, a very interesting autograph of an unpublished sightreading competition piece by Massenet dated 1882 and the autograph of Gordon Jacob's "PARTITA" for solo bassoon written for William Waterhouse in 1969. (This last work was very well performed in a concert given by Mr. Waterhouse later in the same day.) Also in the exhibit were eighteen documents including letters and articles written by Almenräder and Heckel and also a photo of the Heckel factory taken in 1933. Add to these a number of double reeds for various instruments and illustrations of reeds and reedmaking procedures and the exhibition was completed.
Housed in the same hall as the Waterhouse exhibit was the very interesting collection of woodwind, brass and string instruments belonging to the University of Edinburgh. William Waterhouse and Laurence Taylor also arranged a trip to Edinburgh's museum of keyboard instruments on the afternoon of Friday, August 15.
Mr. Waterhouse's contribution to the meeting did not end with his exhibit. On the evening of Tuesday, August 12, with the help of Martin Gatt (London, England), Gunter Angerhöfer (Leipzig, DDR), Ronald Klimko (U.S.A.) and pianist Lindsay Sinclair, he gave a very fine recital. Of special interest were the two works for the tenoroon and piano by Ferdinando Lickl and Frantisek Xavier Dusek and the duo entitled "LIED OHNE NAME" by Igor Stravinsky (1918).
One of the very special features of this year's meeting was the participation of two of our colleagues from East Europe -- Gunter Angerhöfer of Leipzig, DDR and Gheorghe Cuciureanu of Bucuresti, Romania. It was a particular pleasure to meet these gentlemen remembering how difficult it can be for them to obtain exit visas from their countries.
On Wednesday, August 13, Gunter Angerhöfer gave a scheduled talk, with the help of William Waterhouse translating from German, outlining the purposes, research and difficulties involved in writing the monumental six-volume tutor "DAS FAGOTT" which he coauthored with Werner Seltmann, also of Leipzig. We also had the unexpected pleasure, on the morning of August 15, of hearing Herr Angerhöfer play a Galliard sonata on an eighteenth century bassoon with William Waterhouse accompanying on the harpsichord.
It was not known until a week before the meeting that Gheorghe Cuciureanu would be able to attend. Hence no time was scheduled for him to speak about the wonderful innovations which he has designed for the Heckel-system bassoon. However, due to the importance of his work, time was set aside for him to give a demonstration after Herr Angerhöfer's talk. With the help of Roger Birnstingl translating from Italian, Domnul Cuciureanu explained how he has adapted a 5000 series Heckel bassoon to facilitate the fingering technique, especially of the thumbs aiding the lower and higher registers. He also explained how he has eliminated "forks" and crossfingerings and has made it possible for music of all tonalities to be played with the same technical ease as in the key of C Major. Another new possibility of his instrument is that of playing trills and tremolos of up to a perfect fourth, in all ranges, moving only one finger and playing pure harmonics and chords. Domnul Cuciureanu stressed that in his design he has attempted to add as little metal and as few new toneholes as possible to the instrument and to maintain the same general appearance. Even with all the innovations, his bassoon can still be played with the standard fingerings, and its weight is almost identical to the standard Heckel instrument.
After his talk Domnul Cuciureanu played a work which he composed to demonstrate the capabilities of his instrument. He was accompanied by William Waterhouse on the piano.
Domnul Cuciureanu's work shows such fine detail and craftsmanship that it is to be hoped that bassoonists will overcome their apathy towards or prejudice against major change and encourage bassoon manufacturers to design instruments of this type or at least to have the knowledge and capability to alter older instruments to the Cuciureanu system.
The greatest advantage to having an annual meeting so close to Europe is, obviously, the fact that so many Europeans were able to attend, many for the first time. A special welcome was given to Karl Öhlberger of Vienna, Austria and to Lyndsay Langwill of Scotland, both honorary members of the IDRS. Performances were given by Juhani Tapaninen of Finland, Luc Loubry of Belgium and Werner Schulze of Austria.
Excellent as all the European performances were, the highlight of the week was a concert given by Maurice Allard and eight other Paris bassoonists - Michel Denize, Jean-Pierre Laroque, Philippe Le Querrec, Philippe Bertremont, Francois Carry, Andrè Rabot, Robert Dalmasso and Jean-Pierre Seguin (contra-bassoon) -- all of whom, except André Rabot, are former students of M. Allard. They played excellently works for from three to twelve bassoons (with the aid of the North American Bassoon Quartet). The works played included arrangements of Erik Satie "GYMNOPEDIE NO. 1" for five bassoons and Fritz Kreisler's "Caprice Viennois" for four bassoons. Jean-Pierre Laroque gave a very fine performance of the solo bassoon part of Jean Francaix's "DIVERTIMENTO" for bassoon and string quintet with the accompaniment arranged for four bassoons and contrabassoon and M. Allard played wonderfully as always in Dvorak's "HUMORESQUE ET DANSE SLAVE" arranged for four bassoons. It was a fine opportunity for North American bassoonists to experience what fine music can be made with the French bassoon.
Not to underplay the contribution of the North Americans in this year's meeting: Arthur Grossman (Seattle, Washington) and Christopher Weait (Toronto, Canada) both gave recitals on the German bassoon and the North American Bassoon Quartet, made up of Gerald Corey, Charles Holdeman, Kim Laskowski and Ronald Klimko, gave a very fine performance on French bassoons. All the members of this quartet commenced studies of the French bassoon after already achieving proficiency on the German system. They have obviously had great success with their work on the French instrument. It is hoped that more of the German system players will now be encouraged to study the French system (and vice-versa) giving rise to a more versatile bassoonist of the future.
One of the members of the North American Bassoon Quartet, Charles Holdeman, also gave a recital of music for French bassoon alone and with organ. The sonorities of the instrument with organ were particularly rich and rewarding to listen to.
The French bassoon and the French bassoonists made such a strong impression at this year's meeting that one is left feeling that German-system players need to rethink their approach to the bassoon as an expressive instrument and take a lesson or two from our French colleagues. MERCI M. Allard and Co. for sharing your music with us this year.
The excellent concerts, exhibits and lectures are always a pleasure as well as a learning experience, but even more the IDRS annual meetings are also great opportunities for bassoonists to meet together socially and discuss all aspects of their work. This was particularly rewarding at the 1980 meeting as North Americans and Europeans met, many for the first time, and shared and compared their ideas about music and the bassoon. Special thanks to Laurence Taylor for making it possible for this year's meeting to be held in Scotland and, to be sure, all members of the IDRS eagerly await the opportunity to gather together once again on European soil.