I’m sitting onstage in Cologne, Germany, spring of 2005, finishing a concert of American composers’ music (which honestly, I don’t think the Europeans really wanted to hear but clapped politely for nonetheless). As usual, the duration of the concert combined with the hot stage lights and my position as Principal (first chair) French Horn of the Utah Symphony left me hot, sweaty, and stressed out. As we exited the stage, there were some oddly dressed “waiters” with circular serving trays handing us these tall, cylindrical glasses that looked like props from Star Trek. It was cold, delicious beer!

I wasn’t really into beer back then. I knew wine pretty well, and being a native Texan I made a terrific margarita, but beer was my dad’s drink, and the smell of Bud Light cans in the trash in Texas summer heat isn’t the best introduction to the world of beer.

On this, our big, one and only tour of Europe we were scheduled to play 13 cities in 15 days in Slovenia, Germany, and Vienna. I got to see beautiful hops fields coming up, and as much great beer as we could all find in the limited time we had, but none was better than that first amazing Kölsch.

On our one day off in Germany, the horn section took a train, from Regensburg, to Tiefenried to meet the maker of our instruments, Engelbert Schmid. We of course took the wrong train, he had to come pick us up, and we toured his shop and went to lunch at a tiny inn where he was friends with the owners. We naturally all had a beer, and he laughed at us when we asked for seconds. “You’re all going to be asleep!” he admonished, probably hoping we would be buying more equipment.

Being a crazy, obsessive musician type, I got back to America and learned all I could about beer and homebrewing through various books and tons of magazines (like this one). I grew seven varieties of hops, and brewed many types of beers, leaning towards Kölsch of course, pales, English beers, IPAs, and the occasional Belgian golden ale. Several years went by and I increased my library and brewing experience.

My story takes a turn however, when an ominous tingling started in one hand, then the other. My neck had decided to grow extra bone in very inappropriate places. I ended up with three surgeries and three sets of hardware, but the pain only got worse. During that time, my frontal sinus became completely occluded, requiring five surgeries and a complete obliteration to fix. I had to eventually quit performing and realize that I was disabled as I could not lift any significant weight and was in constant pain. It was also painful not being a part of something I worked so hard to succeed at since I was 10 years old.

Needless to say, with the hoisting of heavy tanks of propane and hauling a keg full of wort around; brewing was completely out of the realm of possibility for me. I gave it up for a long time. Then one day while browsing the internet, I saw Blichmann Engineering had coils for heating, and I realized that I could eliminate the major heavy lifting if I retrofitted my brew keg and improvised a tier system. Brewing was no longer impossible!
It might seem like a small thing to most people, but for me, regaining the ability to brew feels like getting a small piece of my life back. The first beer I’m going to brew . . . you even need to ask? A frosty, well cold-conditioned German-style Kölsch!