Posts made by ROWUK

@Dr-GO Can I pinch a fag?

@Kehaulani said in How do you feel about vibrato?:

Now that's what I was looking for, thanks, rowuk!

So, basically, discussing vibrato performance practices are the same as a Kenny G, thread on Sax on the Web.

I think that we have to be careful. All of my studies on Historically Informed Performances show that those who wrote books hundreds of years ago weren't always objective. We have to look at many different sides to get a picture that lets us make an educated guess.

I believe that there has ALWAYS been natural vibrato and only by force, can we limit it. The consummate trumpeter needs it all, but when I show up at the HIP gigs, the conductor determines what we do. I do not like confrontation during rehearsals - even if "he or she" calling the shots is NOT informed.

I am personally more interested in how vibrato was used as an ornament (instead of as a standard parameter of tone). Bach, for instance has several excerpts that imply a special tremolo or vibrato. They are written as a series of static notes (one pitch as 8th notes for instance - see Christmas Oratorio first Chorus B part for an instance) with a slur.

@Brian-Moon said in Is a $280 New Bach Stradivarius Trumpet too good to be true?:

@Kehaulani

For even while we were with you, we used to give you this order: if anyone is not willing to work, then he is not to eat, either.

NOTICE:
This is not speaking of those that are not able to work. It speaks of those who are too lazy to work, which is where communism leads to because there is no incentive to work other than the minimum in order to stay out of trouble.

Actually, there is a problem with this. Many are willing to work but companies are punished (on the stock market) for investing in employees. Is the large group of automobile workers that got laid off at fault for bad mangement decisions resulting in bad sales? Is "new technology" killing traditional jobs?

What killed the instrument building companies in the states? What killed Kodak? What killed PanAm? Is it REALLY offshore manufacturing? Are the employees at fault when so many jobs are lost and nothing fills the gap? I think that we need to look more closely in the mirror and resist being manipulated by those seeking to divide.

@Dirk020 said in B&S Trumpets:

After reading so many hallelujah stories about B&S trumpets I had to give that brand a try.

Mod. 3137 Challenger I: Bach 180/37 copy. A well made horn, good valves but the sound didn't even come close to my old Elkhart Bach 180/37. Sold it to a German guy

Mod. MBX. 72-ish bell, ml. bore, l leadpipe and tuning slide. Good sounding horn but to me way too heavy. I traded this one in for a Yamaha 8130 Z. The latter was way easier to play for me

Mod. eXquisite Malcolm McNab. Copy of his old m-bore Vincent Bach Stradivarius. This one I ordered from Thomann; in 2009 they where the only shop who had them in stock. Beautiful made instrument but for me so hard to play that I was glad that I could return it. The m-bore Conn 22B 'Victor' turned out to be a way better match, that one I played for years until I exchanged her for a Getzen Eterna

At least I gave it a try but I.ll have to say that to me the B&S trumpets where one big disappointment

Actually, the analysis of what went wrong is a bit different. We are creatures of habit. If we have something much different than what we are used to, there is a necessary period to acclimate - which can be months. Naturally when we are looking for a new horn, this makes "change" not so easy or economically feasible. In this case you were disappointed - and understandably so, but at the end of the day we do not know if it was the instrument or an inner unwillingness to change. This is exactly the point that screws a lot of peoples lives up. Projection of fault. We do not know if a "problem" is hardware or software. To test this concept, take your best playing horn and play it in a church with good acoustics, in a bedroom, outdoors near a lake, in a bathroom and take notes about the blow and feel. It will be 4 different instruments - with the only difference how you hear yourself. Another test is to insert earplugs when playing - we hear ourselves worse and the trumpet gets "stuffier".

Now we can argue that an instrument with "inferior response" is not one that we should buy - but sometimes we are so influenced by the factor blow that we ignore many other parameters that could expand our playing. Anyone that tries a very heavy trumpet like a Monette or Harrelson needs time to get the ears and brain organised.

My personal rule of thumb is to never buy anything unless I can clearly and rationally define what is missing from what I am using. That guided me from Bach to Schilke and then finally Monette mouthpieces.
My trumpets each have a defined palette of colors for specific playing jobs.

@Kehaulani said in How do you feel about vibrato?:

I read about instrumental vibrato imitating the human voice, but who's to say that the voice used little or copious vibrato?

What the human voice does is often put into the context of modern reflection. But who is to say that vibrato is natural to the human voice?

Yes, vibrato is natural to the human voice. We can learn to control it. When I took voice lessons (first counter tenor then tenor), everything below let say mezzoforte was easy to control. At Puccini or Verdi orchestral levels, you have no choice.

Generally we can look at folk music for models. European, east european and asian folk music shows abundant use of vpcal and instrumental techniques. Old pipe organs have a stop "Vox Humana" (16th-18th century) which seeks to imitate vibrato. So even if we have informed historical performing practice with little or no vibrato, the organ builders told a different story.

Here is a good write up with a moderate view: https://www.earlymusicamerica.org/emag-feature-article/vibrato-wars/

@administrator Tuva Semmingsen sings Vivaldi!

@Kehaulani Vibrato became an issue when orchestras started playing more loudly. The model is the human voice and as long as we stay at historical "chamber" music levels, it is possible to sing with minimum vibrato. Approach operatic levels and there is no choice. As far as timetables go, the beginnings of recorded music shows use of substantial vibrato - check out the cornet recordings of Vincent Bach or Herbert Clarke. Vibrato a plenty was popular in American orchestras until the early 70s. Maurice André used more than noticable quantities - as did the trumpeters from the Philadelphia, Cleveland and Chicago symphony orchestras. Timofei Dokschitzer had a wonderful vibrato on just about everything that he played. Starting with the late 70s, the aestethics changed. Less became more.

To add a bit to my comment about cheap tools twice:

We ALWAYS have to consider what we are using the instruments for. An amateur in a town band will certainly have different NECESSITIES than the working pro. If I read the comments by many amateurs on the internet, I wonder how they really play. The comments do not match the requirements. Many times we have a luxury issue - more money than common sense. We cannot necessarily equate price with performance but there is a bottom line for quality.

At the end of the day, no one can answer the Bang for the Buck question for someone else. How much is pride in ownership worth? How much inspiration do we get from having something special in our hands? How many owners handicap themselves by believing the yarns that they spin.

What is "value"? Do we compare purchase price to what you can recover after 5 or 10 years?

I have always learned that we buy cheap tools twice.

I feel that the consummate trumpeter needs it all. They need to be able to play with and without it, they need hand, jaw and gut vibrato. Above all, they need the musical intelligence to know the difference.

Someone noticing "too much vibrato" means that the player does not understand their audience!

Let's get this "higher quality made in the US" notion out of our heads. Quality has NOTHING to o with location. Quality is a function of responsible decisions in the manufacturing process. America has NOTHING that would be decisive in higher quaity instruments. Every company decides how much "quality" goes into their products. In the case of chinese manufacturers, the importers placing the order decide how much "quality should be built and they get what they pay for.

As far as Americans out of work, that is how capitalism works. Money does not care if a specific group of people are employed. It only cares if anyone is left to buy the products.

The bore size of a trumpet is pretty much insignificant as a single parameter. There are bright and dark small and large bore trumpets, there are free blowing large and small bore trumpets. The achievable volume is not a function of the bore, rather the efficiency of the working system. We are not listening to an amplified buzz of the lips, rather a resonance (standing wave) in the horn. Due to a mismatch in the length of the horn and the bell shape, a small portion of that resonance “leaks” out. That is what we hear.

It is safe to say that most trumpet building companies do not have a specific sound color that they are building. They may have - by luck, found something that works and is saleable. Contrast this to the high end automobile industry where the sound of an exhaust system, slamming door, road noise leaking into the passenger area are all carefully engineered.

What is the common denominator of Schilke trumpets? I would say manufacturing quality, not a tonal characteristic. Bach is known for their core - something that has not changed or improved for decades. Yamaha on the other hand reinvented the trumpet sound with a Xeno. There is a characteristic tone through the whole range of those trumpets. The better Bachs from many companies also offer no real tonal advantage and those companies building them did not have tone as the goal, rather only sales.

In my world, next to Yamaha is Monette. He is not the Burger King of trumpets, you don’t get it your way. The trumpets have a characteristic sound that is consistent through ALL of the models.

There is plenty of room for innovation. We simply need to start asking the right questions and that starts maybe 50 feet in front of the horn. My first question would be “do trumpets need to be as loud as they are”. I believe that most modern trumpets have a dramatically comprimised tonal palette of colors due to the fact that they were built for louder. The first lawsuits have been won because of the damage that the brass intensity causes in orchestras. Can’t we get that glorious halo around the sound at a lower loudness? Most certainly - but not from companies selling bore size.

Many want simple answers to complex questions. That is normally a sign of something not good ahead. That is how politics work and we all know how that ends up.

I can appreciate the question. Back at the old place I started at a time where the web had novelty for me. I had little or no other "social media" on my plate. My level of interest in repeating myself was certainly far different than it is today. Still today, I have essentially no motivation to start that over again. Whether it stays that way, or if something pops up to spark my interest, I simply do not know. Currently the additional time behind the horn reaps fruits - that the Internet does not. Sorry.

@N1684T Around $400.00

B&S is a well known German company in a traditional brass making region in Germany on the Czech border. They are very serious about what they do.

B&S stands for Blas und Signalinstrumentenfabrik = Wind and fanfare instrument company. They have been around for a ling time.

I consider the Challenger series NOT to be the best horns that they build, but to be the better Bach trumpets.

Yep, the shiniest trumpet - for the first 6 months. The problem with heavy trumpets is that unless they are really well tuned, the honeymoon is over after 8 weeks.

I had an elderly tuba playing student that got back to playing before he could even speak again. Tongue/breath coordination helped a whole lot as did forming the embouchure. What helped most was playing in front of a mirror which offered at least optical feedback before the sense of „feel“ came back.

My recommendation for practice is to take notes and rejoice in accomplished „small steps“! This is my strategy for all students, but especially if we have a temporary or permanent handicap, we need all of the objectiveness that we can find.

Upper range? Considering the standard repertoire for trumpet, up to E or F above high C is pretty much „standard range“.

In any case, one (and I do) can use the same fingerings as an octave lower. Then the transitions sound clean. F above high C is not in tune or centered in pitch when played open. It is almost F#.

Now, with the natural trumpet, the melody range starts with that high C (albeit, due to the much longer instrument, it sounds an octave lower). With that instrument, you have to learn a new „vocabulary“ with no valves to help.

Nice comparison Trent. My experience with the tuning bell Schilkes is fine up to mezzoforte after which the transition to loud is much less controllable than bells with braces. The brilliance just takes off - which is fine for big band jazz or combo work, but in a classical setting becomes a liability. Countless tests with sound posts did not solve my problem.

I liked the original B1 bell and the Kanstul Benge copy best. It had the right combination of core and halo for my ears. The other three were very good but not as balanced in tone/core. I have a student with a tuning bell Schilke B1, B6 and a modified C. The B1 and C trumpets have the best balance and playing duets has sum and difference tones bouncing all over the practice room.

For my tuning Bell Bach 229H, I developed a brace for tuning slide bells. That gave me the response advantage of a brace and the intonation advantage of the tuning bell.

If I owned that horn, it would also be a keeper. It is so much different than everything else and thus broadens the palette of colors that I could offer.

@stumac I think that most are dead because the market did not want what they were making - for the price that they were asking. Value is an interesting concept and it is still exists today. When businesses expand, they take a risk. When businesses have more overhead than turnover, they have a problem.

I admire the Chinese for their granular production. The same production line can build a $50 or a $1000 trumpet. The quality is determined by the person placing the order not the artisan. I have played prototypes of both. The knowledgable reseller does not HAVE to screw their customer.

On another side, I bought a 3d printer and have been printing mouthpieces. They are WAY TOO GOOD. I am not selling or taking orders, I am learning and offering my students the possibility to play before they pay. They can evaluate what the difference between an A, B, C, D, E cup is as well as backbores and rim shapes. Then they buy what works. There has not been much R&D on natural trumpet mouthpieces - just copies made of historical ones without knowledge if they were „high performance“ back then. For less than $1, I can experiment until I am happy. Then the 3d model can be made in silver, brass, copper or any printable plastic. Will this change the mouthpiece market - I certainly believe so. Print on demand could be a great advantage to a pro shop. No appreciable inventory. The printers with suitable resolution are available. Kelly mouthpiece anyone?