Best posts made by Trumpetsplus

This was the 303rd daily song I posted on January 26

Let's throw the cat in!

The conventional opposite of "professional musician" is "amateur musician".

"Amateur" is from the latin root: amare - to love (Fr. amour, It. amore, Eng. amorous) which would suggest that an amateur musician is someone who loves being a musician?

As love is at the other end of the scale from hate, is it not then the implication that the professional musician is someone who hates being a musician?

Just put this up on my Waiata page http://www.jaegerbrass.com/Blo/index.html

Why do scales go up?

When you ask someone to sing or play a scale why do they always perform an ascending scale? I do this experiment often and very seldom does anyone descend.

Why is it so easy to recognize “Do-Re-Mi” from The Sound of Music as a scale even though it is very broken up, but not so easy to recognize that the theme of the Nutcracker “Pas de Deux” is a straightforward descending major scale?

Could it be that the period of early concert music, early music pedagogy and early musicology was when string instruments dominated? String instruments are, by their nature, ascending instruments and ascending scales are amongst the first things played after open strings?

If you ask someone why they play ascending they will often reply that they were taught that way. But why were they taught that way?

We will never know the answer, but it’s an interesting question, isn’t it?

@Niner Thanks for your comments. My ascending valve Bb/C trumpet plays, feels, and sounds like a trumpet.

My comments about cornets apply to the "traditional" BBB cornet, and do not necessarily apply to the various "A" series Conns, or similar models from other manufacturers. The acid test I use when I am defining the 2 instruments is:
Is the "Trumpet" an acceptable instrument in all trumpet inclusive ensembles.
Is the "Cornet" an acceptable instrument in serious British Brass Band ensembles.

Lot of input from a new member. I would like to see the answer to Barliman's question about contacting Phaeton. The situation feels strange, even fishy. As Flugelgirl says, you get your local tech (or yourself) to change out valve stems.

Not sure what you are asking, but I am happy to help. Wiki lists the sizes of number and letter drills
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drill_bit_sizes

@Dirk020 I would certainly bow to any rotarians amongst us, but superficially:
Rotary flugel and piston flugel are very similar; short adjustable length lead pipe straight into valves, then gradual taper all the way to the bell.

Rotary trumpet has valves positioned the same as flugel, then an "extension lead pipe" connects to the main slide after which the tubing tapers to the bell.

So a similarity is placement of the valves and a difference is the flugel is tuned at the lead pipe and the trumpet at the main slide.

@dale-proctor Thanks Dale. I speak some German and will need to pass a basic language test in order to stay there.

Number drill sizes are based on an ANSI standard The gauge-to-diameter ratio is not defined by a formula, but is instead based on, but is not identical to, the Stubs Steel Wire Gauge, which originated in Britain during the 19th century.

Forget any third party printout, it is all based on that standard. No issues, just move on. The drill number in the ANSI standard is the size. Remember, drills do not always drill the same size, there is allowable tolerance.

@ssmith1226 MAW valves when depressed and Rotary valves in both states present a sharp edge at the entrance to the chamber to anything flowing through. Conventional piston valves do not present this sharp edge.

@rowuk We look forward to seeing you again!

Also be aware that the backbore is machined from the end of the shank with a specialty shaped form tool or reamer, and the cup is machined from the face of the mouthpiece, in the old days with a shaped form tool but now with a single point tool in a CNC lathe. Where these two cuts meet is the throat, which, in a perfect world will be a single point with a diameter of #27 or #26 or whatever the maker wants the throat to be. The world is not perfect so this throat area normally ends up being a short cylindrical section finished to size with an appropriate parallel reamer because the tendency will always be to finish the backbore portion and the cup portion slightly under size.

@trumpetb Thank you for your kind words. So much of trumpet design and playing can only easily be described by metaphor. Take the common instructions from teachers "use more air". Well, when one actually measures the amount of air going through the trumpet, or considers the length of a phrase, one realises that these instruments are not pneumatic circuits. But the instruction is valid! In trumpet design all we can do is experiment to see what works - when a computer simulation can predict what will happen when a particular brace is moved I will hang up my mouthpiece!

As far as the sharp and gentle curves are concerned, bearing in mind that sound waves love straight lines, I like to imagine the pathway as something like the attached sketch, where each time the wave (the red line) hits the wall some higher frequencies are lost (like the boom box in a car several corners away - you hear the bass but not the treble). In the sketch the gentle curve of the tuning slide has many more collisions than the sharp valve slide bend.

Please remember this is ONLY A THOUGHT - and as I have often said
I think does not equal it is

@bigdub Beautiful playing, beautiful music. We used to play a Brass Band arrangement of this in the 60s, and I recently arranged it for my local band.

Also, I included this piece in my collection of tunes "Music 4 Fun".

@OldSchoolEuph Well it used to work for us. Blame it on Kiwi ingenuity

So now we can officially give you a hard time!

@rowuk I will be around 5-15 August and would love to see you. My Gutenstein dates are the week of the 21st.

@Vulgano-Brother You are jumping the gun somewhat. Shapes of curves will be addressed in a future Waiata.

Given the apparent Nickel plated finish, the design of the water keys and the low serial number I might guess it was made in Soviet Russia. I have seen similar examples.