brian moon

I was looking at the National Trumpet Competition rules and saw that part of the Natural Trumpet requirements include playing with no holes. My Meinl and Laubers do not leak bad enough to make a decent sound on a top line F. Do people use horns that are held together with pitch in order to play with no holes or are there some brands that play ok with no holes?

Happy New Year!

Brian Moon

ROGERIO

Sorry Brian... maybe it's just me... but you lost me. (????)

What is it exactly that you're asking?

Are you saying your horn leaks so it's vented anyway?

brian moon

Or maybe it's me?

An F is not possible on my horn without the holes. IMHO It has to be bent too out of center when the holes are covered to make a decent sound. I am wondering what natural trumpets make this possible.

Modern horns are soldered but the originals used pitch to hold them together. I imagine that a horn using pitch would leak enough to be able to bend the F's and F#'s in tune.

Bahb Civiletti won this contest in 2004. What horn does he use? I wonder if they had the "no holes" part of the contest then?

trumpetera

Hi!

You ARE indeed supposed to lip the f's and f sharps on a authentic natural trumpet!

The instruments used back then did probably not leak.

A authentic or copy of a authentic mpc makes it a little easier due to the sharp entrance of thye throat in the cup, and also the stepped backbore makes a difference.

Since I live in Sweden and do not compete on natural trumpet, but play both that and modern trumpet for a living, I stick to a modern mouthpiece (allthough "baroqueified" on the outside so that the purists does not see that it is in fact a YAMAHA 14C4!) and the "british" 4 vent hole system.

Good luck in the contest!

ecarroll

Brian,

Our new Swedish friend (welcome!) is right. Have you heard Jean-François Madeuf (Schola Cantorum, Basel) play the holeless natural trumpet? Trust me. . . he can play the Bach Cantatas in tune on the tailpipe of a Buick.

Two suggestions: an authentic (flat rim, no throat) mouthpiece, as suggested above, helps tremendously, and don't expect the nat to slot the notes for you like a modern trumpet. It doesn't (and shouldn't)

Good luck,
EC

trombapaul

But does he get doubling pay for doing that?

Paul

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trumpetera

Thanks for the welcome!

There is a german instrument maker, Thein in Bremen, germany who makes an exact copy of a baroque trumpet (don't know which one). When they examined the original, they noted that the mouthpiece reciever was wery "far in" in the instrument. When playing it with a mouthpiece of a normal baroque length, you actually hit the back bow ow the bell with your cheek. Inside the mouth-pipe they disovered length-going scrathes from the beginning of the tube and about 10cm's down. This led them to believe that the instrument used to háve a short correction-slide in the mouthpiece-end of it. This is not to be confused with the "tromba da tirarsi" (slide trumpet) wich have a much longer slide.

I've tried the trumpet, and I have to say that it felt a bit awkward in the beginning, but if one can learn the quite irrational fingerings of a three or four hole trumpet I'm sure that one can learn this too!

I've seen paintings of trumpeters from the baroque era where they hold the trumpet with their right hand, and the left hand fingers grabs the mouthpiece suggesting that Theins theory can be right!

One also must remember that Europe was HUGE at the time (traveling took a LONG time), so maybe this was done in one area of Europe while not in another part.

In those days the note "a" could differ up to a minor third from region to region!

Food for thought, I think!

All the best!

brian moon

Very satisfying food too! That makes a lot of sense.

The horn put together with pitch WILL leak more than one soldered together.

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rowuk

Natural trumpets that are made with hand made tubing instead of the perfectly round extruded tubing can be played in tune without the vents. It does require a fair amount of practice, but does work. No need for a slide. If the slide were true, I am sure we would have an original somewhere.

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GordonH

If the bore is larger they are easier to play in tune.
I made my own D trumpet and it can be lipped quite easily.

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