Audition Mode Kicks Off Connoisseur Series at Southern Miss

The University of Southern Mississippi kicks off its annual Connoisseur Series with a free community concert set for 6 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 14 at Marsh Auditorium on the Hattiesburg campus.

“We are absolutely thrilled to host Audition Mode in Hattiesburg,” Said Dr. Jacquelyn Adams, assistant professor of Horn at Southern Miss. “Karl Pituch, principal horn for the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, and Denise Tryon, fourth horn for the Philadelphia Orchestra, bring a huge range of experience and have each expanded the boundaries of the professional horn community as world class orchestral musicians, soloists, and teachers.”

Pituch was named Principal Horn of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in 2000. Before joining the DSO, Pituch was Associate Principal Horn with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Principal Horn with the Honolulu Symphony Orchestra, the Jacksonville Symphony and the Colorado Music Festival Orchestra.

He served as a guest Principal Horn for the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the Chautauqua Festival Orchestra and the Grand Teton Festival Orchestra. Pituch can be heard on many recordings with the Dallas, San Francisco and Honolulu Symphony Orchestras.

Pituch was the grand prize-winner at the 1989 American Solo Horn Competition and has been a finalist at many other solo competitions. As a soloist, Pituch has performed with orchestras in Japan, Hawaii, Colorado, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Ohio, Florida and Michigan. He has been a frequent guest artist at numerous horn conferences and has served as a judge in the American Horn Competition.

An active chamber musician, Pituch was a member of the Spring Wind Quintet for 11 years and participated in chamber music festivals in Marlboro, Vermont; Crested Butte, Colorado; Kapalua, Maui; Kazusa, Japan and Freden, Germany (with the American Horn Quartet).

Pituch earned his bachelor's degree from the University of Toledo where he studied with Mary Kihslinger. He also studied with Froydis Wekre of the Oslo Philharmonic and Dale Clevenger of the Chicago Symphony. For seven years, he was the horn instructor at the University of Hawaii.

A native of Roseville, Minn., Tryon joined The Philadelphia Orchestra in 2009 as fourth horn. Previously the fourth horn of the Detroit Symphony (2003-2009), she has also held positions with the Baltimore (2000-2003), Columbus (1998-2000), and New World (1995-1998) Symphonies and has participated in the Colorado Music Festival and the Pacific Music Festival. An accomplished solo performer, Tryon has performed recitals in Sweden, Norway, Poland, Japan, and the United States.

In 1989 Tryon graduated from the famed Interlochen Arts Academy and in 1993 received her Bachelor of Music degree from the New England Conservatory of Music (NEC) in Boston. She received the Presidential Scholarship while in the Artist Diploma Program at NEC with the Taiyo Wind Quintet, which won the Coleman Chamber Competition and worked with great composers such as John Harbison, Luciano Berio, György Ligeti, and Elliott Carter.

An active and accomplished educator, Tryon is sought after for her masterclasses. She has taught extensively in the United States, Scandinavia, Europe and Asia. Beth Graham of the Warsaw Philharmonic and founder of the Warsaw Horn Workshops raves, “In just a few seconds of listening to a student she can diagnose deep-seated problems and give immediate fixes, often with a healthy dose of humor as well. The transformations she can accomplish in just a short time are truly remarkable.”

In 2009, Tryon founded Audition Mode, a yearly horn seminar, with Karl Pituch. In 2010 she was an International Horn Society (IHS) Northeast Workshop Featured Artist. She was a contributing artist at the IHS Symposium in San Francisco in 2011, as well as one of the Solo Artists at the Nordic Hornfest in Norway in 2012.

She was on the horn faculty at BIBA (Blekinge International Brass Academy) in Sweden in 2013, as well as one of the Solo Artists at the Warsaw Horn Workshops that same year. In 2014, Tryon was a Featured Artist at the IHS MidNorth Horn Workshop. Since 2007 she has served on the faculty of the Peabody Conservatory in Baltimore.