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JULY 2005 / JUNE 2007 . As a professional visual artist with degree in graphic designs and 17 years of working experience I am generally a very visual oriented person. One of the reasons of my love for the french horn, besides it's wonderful tone, is, it looks great! Searching around on homepages of all known manufacturers, I decided to pick out which ones are the most beautiful horns available. No question, every of the full double horns I've found is a king of instruments, but there are some details that can make the difference between a nice looking horn and an absolutely perfect beauty.
This is a horn beauty contest
I did a study of the differences between available horn designs and analyzed what are the reasons that one horn looks esthetically more pleasing then an other one. I've found some specific factors that are responsable for this. Each one gives a horn a beauty point if accomplished. The best designs with all factors completed earn the title of a "Perfect Beauty", the ones that lack only one factor earn the title "Beauty". Of course all of this has nothing to do with playability and sounding or crafting qualities of this horns, as I said this is only a visual analysis. Only F/Bb double horns (maybe with A stop valve in some cases) are taken into consideration.
 
BALANCE FACTOR
If the rotary valves horizontal axis stays to close to the middle of the instruments body the valve keys must be placed too far away. Most tubes stay on the left side while the right side contains not much more then a long junction between valves and keys. The Alex 103 is a typical and very extrem example of this factor, but as it is one of the most professionally played instruments it also shows that this design factors have nothing to do with the sounding qualities of an instrument.
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Here where I live it's wise to have two horns because no one here makes horn repairs or even sells horns, I would be lost with one horn only. So I decided for a Finke Brendan as my main instrument, having the Conn 10d for backup.
If you would like to have a hornplayer poster, see this one I've made of Barry Tuckwell. |
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KNOTED TUBES FACTOR
Here is the reason why no Kruspe wrapped horn (except one) made it to the Top 10 Beauties. The B rotary valves position causes that too much tubes must search entangled ways in and out of the B valve. In Switzerland we call that "ein Gewurstel" (muddling). This should not mean that it is not possible to make a Kruspe without knoted and outstanding tubes, McCracken shows that it is possible to make a beautiful looking Kruspe with his model 7 double.
FOTO ATKINSON 102 |
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HOLE FACTOR
This is a problem mainly for the Geyer horns. The tubes that go in to the first valve and come out the last valve often go straight what causes two big empty spaces B then hide behind the big final wrap tubing what causes another empty space A. Horns like Paxman 23 don't hide this tubes and go with a bend into the valves what's filling the spaces and generally looks much more interesting then a stright tubing. Some horns close the one or other space more or less. |
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TUBE ART FACTOR
The less the tubes look like a tinmans or plumber's work the better. Therefore this one is related to the "knoted tubes" factor where it can be seen how a plumbers work looks: Curves that first go into a straight tube before connecting through joints to something. Beautiful are Rounded, curved tubes that are connected directly flowing from the curved form, they look more then art then simply functional.
FOTO E. SCHMID TRIPLE |
Holton 478ER |
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Conn 8d |
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Alexander 403 |
SEE FOR YOURSELF
Here are three different full double horns, only one of this made it to the Perfect Beauties. What do you think which one is it?
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 DECORATIONS (this is not a factor)
First looking to a horn that has a detachable bell with garland and valve caps with decorations and then looking to a horn without any of this things, the second horn seems like a naked one. The ring of a detachable bell makes a nice partition exactly at a part of the horn that (without ring) lookes boring from certain angles. But of course this is not a factor for this contest because it's a question of personal taste. Garland, bell cut and valve cap decorations can be fit any time additionally to any horn (at least I suppose so). FOTO KEITH BERG
INTERESTING GREAT DETAILS .. 
In my opinion the more balanced a horn is in placing of the rotary valves, the more interesting it looks, therefore I find the Cornford C28 or the Ricco Kühn 294 with displaced first and fifth valves or the Alexander 403 and Kalison kbc 26 with three valves in front and Bb-Valve on backside the most interesting of this horns.
THE THEIN M 
Should I put the Thein M among the Perfect Beauties or not? It was difficult to decide because there are very few photos around of this horn. I finally got some pictures from Malte Mory who designed it, and it became clear that the Thein M clearly deserves to be among the perfect beauties, I personally beliefe it to be the most beautiful horn of them all.
The Perfect Beauties
Alexander 200 |
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Alexander 403 |
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Cornford C28 |
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McCracken model 7 |
Thein M
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Yamaha 667v
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Thanks to Thompson Edition for the photo of the McCracken.
Thanks to Malte Mory for the pictures of the Thein M
Thanks to Johannes Finke for my great new horn.
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