Join us in Episode 75 for a conversation with 2025 IHS Punto Award Winner Xiao-Ming Han! Xiao-Ming recently retired from the German Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and returned to his native China to teach at the Shanghai Conservatory of Music.

Episode Highlights

• Growing up in China in the 1960s in a musical family
• Choosing between music and sports
• Attending conservatory in Beijing at age 14.
• Joining the China Philharmonic at age 17.
• Early meeting with Richard Mackey, replacing Richard Mackey at the last minute on Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony conducted by Seiji Ozawa.
• Leaving China at 18 to pursue horn at Tanglewood and the New England Conservatory.
• Studying in Germany and winning an orchestral position at the age of 21.
• Coming back to his roots in Shanghai as a professor to mentor the next generation of players
• Promoting the IHS in China

Our guest for Episode 73 is Elizabeth Freimuth, professor of horn in the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University, former principal horn of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, and a member of the IHS Advisory Council!

Episode Highlights

• Teaching full time at her Alma Mater, Rice University
• Differences between teaching full time and performing in an orchestra full time.
• Changes in teaching philosophy over the years
• Balancing analytical mindset vs. performance mindset
• Importance of the IHS
• International Horn Competition of America
• Technology and horn playing/teaching
• “It’s a very distracting world…”
• Cincinnati Symphony/Pops stories
• Keeping playing fundamentals in order