This document provides an overview of several brass instruments - trumpet, French horn, trombone, and tuba. It describes the basic characteristics of each instrument such as their shape, how sound is produced by blowing air through the mouthpiece, and some historical facts. Links to audio examples of each instrument are also included.

1. Elements: Instruments
Brass
Music Appreciation
Unit 2

2. Brass
• Brass instruments include all the instruments
that are made of brass or any other metal.
• Their mouthpieces are shaped like a cup or
funnel shape.
• The player presses his or her lips into the
mouthpiece and as he or she blows the lips
vibrate.
• This vibration is passed on to the column of
air in a tube, and sound is produced.

3. Trumpet
• The trumpet is the highest register in the brass family.
• Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments,
dating back to at least 1500 BC.
• They are played by blowing air through closed lips,
producing a "buzzing" sound.
• Since the late 15th century they have primarily been
constructed of brass tubing, usually bent twice into a
rounded oblong shape.
• Earlier trumpets did not have valves, but modern
instruments generally have three piston valves.

4. Trumpet
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/trumpet.
mp3
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/trumpete
xcerpt.mp3

5. French Horn
• There is a funny myth about how the French
horn was invented.
• Many years ago a strict old music teacher told
his pupil, “If you don’t practice that horn. I’ll
wrap it around your neck.”
• So he did and we have come to know the wound
long brass tubes in a circle as the French horn.
• A funny tale, but the tubing on a French horn is
many feet long and if it were outstretched and
unraveled it would look like a long trumpet.

6. French Horn
• Because the tubing is so long on a French horn
controlling the intonation (accurate pitch) is an
extremely difficult task.
• Hunters to tell friends which way a fox had gone
during a hunt first used the French horn.
• Hunting call signals could be heard for miles and
by the time the horn found its way into the
orchestra its sound had become elegant, noble
and capable of producing beautiful tones that
contain full round and dark qualities.

7. French Horn
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/frenchho
rn.mp3
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/frenchho
rnsexcerpt.mp3

8. Trombone
• Every marching band has a trombone section.
• The song “76 Trombones” (and a big parade) says it all.
• The trombone is the powerful low instrument of the
brass section.
• It differs from other brass instruments in that it has a
slide.
• When the slide of the trombone is pushed all the way
in, the highest notes can be played.
• As the slide is pulled out, increasingly lower notes are
achieved.

9. Trombone
• This lengthening of the tube to accommodate a
longer column of air produces the lower notes.
• While blowing a continuous stream of air and
moving the slide from its pushed in position to its
outer most position produces a gliding sound
called a glissando.
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/trombone.m
p3
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/trombonesli
de.mp3

10. Tuba
• The tuba is a heavy, large and a hard to carry brass
instrument.
• Equally, it takes enormous breath control and
strength to support the sound.
• It is played similar to the French horn and the tuba
typically plays the bass line in the orchestra.
• Tuba players usually are selected from those who
naturally have a large mouth formation because the
mouthpiece of a tuba must accommodate large lips.
• In fact there is a stereotype tuba player, it often is
“the hefty kid in the marching band".

11. Tuba
• http://www.musicappreciation.com/tuba.mp3