Cor

As Printed on a Score

Cor (plural Cors) labels the horn staff in French scores, almost always with its key: Cors en fa (in F), and in older scores Cor en mi♭ and so on; Cor chromatique (or cor à pistons) marks the valve horn against the natural horn. In F the written notes sound a fifth lower. Do not confuse Cor with Cor anglais, the English horn.

Also spelled: Cors, Cor chromatique

How Composers Use It

French composers kept writing for natural horns beside valve horns well into the nineteenth century, and later French scoring treats the horn as a color instrument — soft, mysterious, often muted (sourdine) or stopped (bouché); Debussy and Ravel ask for both constantly. Write horns in F, mark bouché, sourdine or cuivré where you want them, and think of four horns in two pairs as the standard section.

Example

Ravel, Boléro: the horn staff is headed “4 CORS en fa” — four horns in F, the French en fa where a German score prints in F.

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