MSO Musician Spotlight: Dawson Hartman
David Lewellen
PUBLISHED
Tagged Under: French Horn, MSO Musicians
For being the new kid on the block at the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Dawson Hartman comes with a surprising amount of experience.
Hartman, who recently finished his first season as the MSO’s fourth horn, joined the orchestra after a year and a half in The Phoenix Symphony. Before that, he was an undergraduate at the University of Michigan while also playing for two regional orchestras.
Most musicians in full-time orchestras earn a master’s degree before they win a job, but Hartman was not only employed straight out of college — he was also a double major in music and electrical engineering.
“I wanted to see how far I could go in music,” he says, while he was keeping his options open with a second major. “Winning those two auditions my junior year gave me more confidence that I was good enough. And when I realized that I was practicing in order to procrastinate on studying for engineering, that was a sign.”
As the fourth horn (the same position he held in Phoenix), Hartman usually has the lowest note in whatever chord the section is playing. “I could be a decent high horn,” he says, “but I found it felt more natural to get the low horn parts perfect.”
Phoenix was his first chance to play the long, lyrical solo for fourth horn in the third movement of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9. And within his first month on the job in Milwaukee, that spotlight fell on him again. “I had heard how great the orchestra and chorus sounded, and I knew I had to match that quality,” he says. “After the first concert, I got so many compliments, it was a weight off my shoulders. Over the summer, I knew that would be a big box to check, and afterward, I felt like I belonged.”
Principal horn Matthew Annin enjoyed Hartman’s solo, but he says, “Whether it was a new person or a seasoned person, I’d still be listening very carefully. … Everyone in the symphony is a soloist in some way. Everyone’s time comes, and it came right away for Dawson.” And Hartman faced an extra degree of difficulty because the third movement of Beethoven’s ninth typically gets the least rehearsal time.
In general, Annin said, the fourth horn is “the foundation of the horn section, and often the entire brass section. He sets the bedrock for everyone else to feel comfortable. Dawson knows when to play out and when to blend more, and he makes everything easier.”
At the end of the MSO’s season in June, Hartman was granted tenure, but he remains focused on continuing to grow. Speaking of the other young musicians in the symphony, he said, “We talk about never losing that passion and staying at a high level.” For Hartman, tenure brings a sense of accomplishment, not a reason to stop challenging himself.
Hartman has engagements at two separate music festivals this summer, but he is also making time to be a volunteer band camp counselor for Huron High School in Ann Arbor, his alma mater — a role he has filled every year since he graduated in 2019. When he is at home in Milwaukee’s Riverwest neighborhood, he enjoys biking, running, soccer, and hiking.
Coming up on his 25th birthday, Hartman is one of the youngest musicians in the MSO, but “no one makes me feel young,” he says. “It’s interesting at the end of rehearsal to see some people dashing off to pick up their kids while I can be casual about leaving. We’re all in different stages of life, but there is always someone to relate to.”
In general, he said, “The mentality of our musicians is to create high-quality music and to have fun. When I arrived, almost everyone introduced themselves. In the break room, I see people mixing and talking with different colleagues every day. It’s really something special.”
