A new production of Wagner's 'Tristan und Isolde' at the Metropolitan Opera features a rare wooden holztrompete, specially constructed to the composer's specifications.
The nearly 4-foot horn, measuring 46.5 inches, signals the arrival of the ship carrying Isolde and King Marke to Brittany, inspiring a mortally wounded Tristan to hang on to life.
Principal trumpet Billy R. Hunter Jr. plays the wooden horn from stage left, describing it as 'joyous' and a clear difference from the imitation sound.
The holztrompete's details are more nebulous, with Wagner writing notes for an English horn but including a footnote to his score saying it should have 'the effect of a very powerful natural instrument, such as the alphorn.'
A wood trumpet was used at the opera's premiere, but Wagner's Bayreuth Festival in Germany switched to a newly created woodwind called the Heckel-clarina in 1891.
The tárogató, a woodwind common to Hungarian folk music, was used by the Met when James Levine conducted 'Tristan' from 1981 through 2008.
Conductor Daniel Barenboim brought his own holztrompete to the Met in 2008, and Thomas Lausmann, the Met's director of music administration, ordered a new one to be manufactured by Thein Brass in Bremen, Germany.
The current Met version is slightly different from Barenboim's, with Hunter comparing it to a bugle and noting that its one valve lowers the notes down a step.
