Blowin’ In The Wind Alpenhorn Players Entertain Volunteers Working On Restoring Timber Mountain Lookout Tower

The setting sun cast alpenglow on the western flanks of the Selkirks as Bruce Brummett and Don Henkle filled their lungs with air and pursed their lips to play.

The two blew mightily into the ends of their alpenhorns, and from the hollow bell 12 feet away emanated hauntingly beautiful notes which drifted through the mountains like whale song.

“Beautiful, just wonderful,” onlooker Dana Komen said.

And it was.

The music and the setting - an alpine meadow 6,000 feet above sea level and 20 miles from the nearest town - swirled together to form a mesmerizing combination of sight and sound.

It was an experience that left the 27 people gathered recently atop Timber Mountain outside Cusick, Wash., clamoring for more.

“I like it. How about you?” Komen said.

“The music. The view. Where’s Julie Andrews?”

Henkle, too, was impressed with the experience.

“This is much better than my back yard, which borders on Wellesley Avenue,” said the 20-year member of the Spokane Horn Club, who was clad in red knee socks, black lederhosen, red shirt, yellow suspenders and a forest-green felt hat.

“It sounds beautiful in the woods,” he said. “That’s what the forest horn is all about.”

Brummett and Henkle lugged their alpenhorns, also known as forest horns, to the top of the mountain to celebrate restoration work on a fire lookout tower there.

Members of the Pend Oreille Anthropological Society and other volunteers from the Newport, Wash., area are working with the U.S. Forest Service to rebuild the 36-year-old tower, which last was manned in 1975.

Forest Service officials invited the horn players to Timber Mountain one recent night to entertain volunteers working on the tower project.

The restoration is part of the Forest Service’s Pastports in Time program, which was established to preserve aspects of the nation’s forests that are culturally or historically important.

Volunteers are donating materials and labor to restore the Timber Mountain tower, which overlooks the Pend Oreille River valley.

The group hopes to have the peeling, creaking tower refurbished by the end of summer, said Bill Betz, president of the anthropological society.

People eventually may be allowed to rent the tower for a weekend.

Brummett, Henkle and their alpenhorns kicked off the restoration effort with style.

Henkle explained that herdsmen once used the alpenhorn to signal each other in the mountains of Europe.

“Signal what?” one woman asked.

“That it’s time to come home and make a payment on the house,” Henkle joked.

Now they’re mostly used by musicians like Henkle and Brummett, and in the TV commercials for Ricola cough drops.

The old horns were made from trees that grew out of the steep hillsides of Switzerland. The trees would grow sideways for about a foot before curving toward the sky - hence their unique shape.

Traditional alpenhorns are hard to come by these days, Henkle said. His and Brummett’s horns were manufactured from fiberglass in upstate New York.

“They have a great haunting, tonal quality to them,” Henkle said.

After Henkle and Brummett finished their alpenhorn duet, they joined Paul Manley and Robert Farrar, also members of the Spokane Horn Club, for a French horn concert.

The quartet played various fanfares and marches famous in Germany and other parts of Europe.

“Here’s a song that’s perfect for this setting,” said Farrar, getting a better grip on his French horn. “It’s called ‘The Evening Bells, From a Distance.”’

After the French horns, Henkle and Brummett played an encore on the alpenhorns.

A crescent moon rose into the sky and the Pend Oreille River sparkled more than 5,000 feet below as the two sent resounding notes over the valley.

The crowd swayed with the music in the melting light.

“Sometimes you forget what’s in your own back yard,” Komen said.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color photo