Ed,

I studied with Arthur when I was attending Hofstra University in the
early 1980s. At that time he was also acting as horn professor at
Nassau Community College and the Waldorf School in Garden City Long
Island, as well as playing Evita on Broadway (until an accident/mouth
injury sidelined him for some time). His greatest achievement back
then seemed to be in his private teaching at the local level. A lot
of people really looked up to him and he seemed so capable of
training young students from the ground up who eventually went pro
that it seemed the obvious career path for an aspiring horn player
living on Long Island was to transfer to Hicksville High School (the
point of origin of many of his success stories) and get lessons with
Arthur before attending some place like New England Conservatory or
Boston University and landing a gig with an organization like the
National Symphony (as Sylvia Alimena eventually did). We used to
discuss horn lore from time to time, his year (or was it two?) in the
Chicago Symphony, his time in the Radio City Music Hall Orchestra,
and his time at NEC, where Herseth, as well as yourself, was a
colleague. Arthur also used to stress professional habits and talk
about his daily routine as a commercial player, how he rose early
each morning to warmup, taught the lessons, made the rounds, and got
in his afternoon nap before heading to the theater, making sure that
he left plenty of buffer time in his commute in order that he would
show up early and ready to work. One of the things that I thought
was interesting about Arthur's teaching was that he applied his own
method books in the lessons and the stuff in them was so basic but
effective, as I've heard it said that people could always identify
Arthur's students, even though I personally thought that the students
I heard didn't necessarily sound alike (or like him) at all. To this
day I can still spot people who studied with Arthur whenever I see
someone using a Cor 4 or 5 mouthpiece (he told me he discovered these
on one of his travels in Europe and brought a lot back to the States,
he used one himself in combination with his Paxman double descant at
that time).

I've had Arthur on my mind recently. It started when you mentioned
him in your email from several weeks back referencing the horn studio
at NEC. But the thing that really did the trick was when I was
reading "Blink" this Friday evening and received another blast from
the past when Malcolm Gladwell discussed French Horn players and made
mention of Sylvia Alimena (Arthur's student and a hero of my youth).
I haven't seen her since I bumped into her 29 years ago in Boston,
but her last words to me at the time was to tell Mr. Goldstein she
said hello and that she hoped that she could still play as well as he
could when she reached his age. Like I said, a lot of people looked
up to Arthur Goldstein. LD

--- In horn@yahoogroups.com, "Glick, Ed" <glick@...> wrote:
>
> Debbie,
>
> As you may already have noticed, my first attempt at a reply (see
below) suddenly disappeared as I was writing it. I didn't realize
that it gone out in its truncated form
>
> What I started to say is that this is sad news. I knew him when we
were both in Boston in the late 1940s. You probably know that he was
the famous Professor von Schmutzig. (Younger readers will probably
not know about his little book about the "famous" von Schmutzig, but
it brought a lot of laughter to the horn playing community.
>
> I tried the link that you had posted in your original message, but
it kept taking me to the obituary for a Larry Johnson. Can you check
to see what the correct link might be.
>
> As I said, it was sad news. but thanks for putting it on the list.
I lost touch with Artie when I left Boston in the early 1950s. Does
anyone know what career he had? What orchestras, teaching positions,
etc.?
>
> Ed
>
> From: Glick, Ed
> Sent: Saturday, January 10, 2009 4:24 PM
> To: horn@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: Re: [horn] RIP Arthur Coldstein
>
> Debbie,
>
> This is sad news. I knew him from our days in Boston. Y
>
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Jan 10, 2009, at 2:54 PM, "Debbie Schmidt"
<jasoncat@...<mailto:jasoncat@...>> wrote:
>
>
> Arthur Goldstein passed away last week on Jan. 2.
>
> http://www.legacy.com/Newsday/DeathNotices.asp?
Page=LifeStory&PersonId=12214
> 0718
>
> Is a link to the obituary.
>
> He was a wonderful, humorous guy who was always great to see and be
around.
>
> I will miss him,
>
> Debbie Schmidt
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>