Richard Strauss writing for the horn section

Richard Strauss stands alone atop the list of composers for the horn. True, on the elegant side of the lecture, Mozart was a wonderful writer. However, in those heroic passages that make hornists drool, it was Strauss. Ein Heldenleben, Don Juan, Der Rosenkavalier, Till Eugenspiegel: those are the passages that horn players stand in line to get to play.