acorn484

What are the characteristics of yellow brass, red brass, gold brass and rose brass etc. bells?

rowuk

It depends......................
There are many stereotypes for the sound that these materials are supposed to give. Most of the opinions are based on some old ad text, not facts.

Brass is an alloy made up of copper and zinc. Gold brass has a higher proportion of copper than yellow and red or rose have the most copper content.

Brass is a very malleable material and to form it, it is heated until it is red hot to make it soft, then it is hammered or pressed into shape. This hammering process makes it hard, so to further form it, we have to heat it again.

Depending on the manufacturing process, the bell ends up hard (tempered), soft or somewhere in between.

Hard metals conduct sound waves easily, so a tempered bell lets some of the energy that is in the horn make the bell vibrate and that is reflected off of the outside of the bell to the player. A soft bell does not pass soundwaves as easily so more energy gets to the audience but not as much to the player. Many times a trumpet will incorrectly be branded as "stuffy" when the bell projects better. The player is not getting the feedback that they are used to and compensate with force. Conversely, some instruments are branded as "free blowing" because the player gets a lot of feedback. Often the audience hears a very bright thin sound because of this!

A hard bell will sound brighter than a soft bell (regardless of material) because the lower frequencies pass through the bell more easily and are not projected to the audience. The player however, hears a "darker sound" because those lower frequencies are radiated through the bell. Alloys with more copper content CAN be softer than a yellow brass bell and they COULD project more to the audience - including the lower frequencies for a "darker" sound.

So like trying to define absolute beauty with blonde, brunette, redhead or black hair, your question cannot be answered based on color. The temper, thickness (mass), plating, position of braces and flare have AT LEAST as much to say as the material. The only way to find out what you sound like is to play the instruments yourself and take a second set of trusted ears to tell you what comes out the front. It is impossible to "hear" what the audience hears from behind the trumpet.

__________________
Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.

Firestas'1

Well said Robin,

I might add short of someone going with you, you could also record yourself playing the different instruments.

This will not give a totally accurate picture of what the audience hears but it will provide you some contrast with what you perceive behind the mouthpiece.

__________________


Stan J.

What is to reach the heart must come from above. If it does not, it will be nothing but notes, body without spirit.
--Ludwig van Beethoven

Music is God's best gift to man. The only art of heaven given to earth, the only art of earth we take to heaven.
--Letitia Elizabeth Landon

rowuk

The problem with recording yourself is that you will never hear how the sound spreads or fills the room. When I got my first Monette Prana mouthpiece, I had a gig in a very live hall. The room seemed to be alive. Even the conductor came and commented on my sound (we perform very often together and he had no knowledge of the change in hardware). The recording of the concert did not reproduce that effect.

Another advantage to a second set of ears is a better chance of preventing expectations from becoming reality. Human beings are VERY subject to deceiving themselves..........

__________________
Whenever I feel blue, I start breathing again.