50 Fun Facts About Brass Instruments

Brass, the metal that gives trumpets and tubas their golden shine, is copper mixed with which other metal?

Zinc usually makes up about a third of brass, with copper supplying the rest. Swap the zinc for tin and the result is bronze instead.

Which instrument is made of brass yet counts as a woodwind because its sound comes from a reed?

Saxophone bodies are brass, but a vibrating reed makes the sound, which puts them among the woodwinds. The reverse exists too: the wooden serpent counts as a brass instrument.

A silver trumpet and a bronze one, the oldest that still work, came from which pharaoh's tomb, discovered in 1922?

Tutankhamun's trumpets had been silent for over 3,000 years when the BBC broadcast them live to an estimated 150 million listeners in 1939.

In the Peanuts TV specials, the sound of a muted trombone stands in for the voices of which characters?

The adults were given trombone 'voices' at the suggestion of the specials' composer, Vince Guaraldi. The trick was first used in You're in Love, Charlie Brown.

Which plastic horn's monotone drone became the soundtrack of the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa?

The vuvuzela is about 65 cm of moulded plastic that blares a single loud note. FIFA agreed to allow it in the stadiums in 2010 despite a wave of criticism.

The name 'trombone' is simply the word for 'large trumpet' in which European language?

Italian tromba means trumpet, and the ending -one means large. English players only adopted the name in the 1700s, when music from Italy was the height of fashion.

Which Beatles single features a piccolo trumpet solo that Paul McCartney added after seeing one on television?

Penny Lane's solo was played by David Mason, whom McCartney had watched performing Bach's second Brandenburg Concerto on the BBC just days before the session.

Which household tool, minus its handle, do jazz trumpeters wave in front of the horn to make speech-like sounds?

A plunger head can be held still for a dull tone or moved about for effects. Trumpeters typically use a sink plunger, while trombonists need the bigger toilet kind.

A small coiled brass horn features in the logos of which kind of company across much of Europe?

Postal services kept the post horn as an emblem because its call once announced the arrival or departure of a post rider or mail coach.

The so-called 'spit valve' on a trumpet drains saliva and which other liquid from inside the tubing?

Condensation forms as the moisture in a player's warm breath meets the cooler metal, which is why 'spit valve' is called a misnomer. Bigger horns collect more of it.

How does a trumpet or tuba player set the air vibrating before the tubing shapes it into a note?

Buzzing the lips into a mouthpiece is what makes an instrument 'brass', whatever it happens to be built from. Tightening or loosening them is enough to jump between notes.

When a trumpet player presses a valve down, what happens to the tubing the air has to travel through?

It gets longer, because each valve sends the air through an extra loop of pipe, and more pipe means a lower note. Three valves are enough to give seven different lengths.

Instead of valves, which moving part does a trombone player push and pull to change notes?

A slide changes the length of the tubing smoothly rather than in steps, so a trombone can swoop from one note to the next without any break in the sound.

Where does a French horn player usually keep the right hand while the left hand works the valves?

Inside the bell, a cupped right hand can nudge the pitch and darken the tone. Players began doing it in the mid-1700s to reach notes the valveless horn could not otherwise play.

The French horn descends from coiled horns that riders on horseback once blew during which pursuit?

Hunting horns were a French speciality: makers there were credited with creating the instrument's now-familiar circular hoop shape.

Which wrap-around marching tuba takes its name from the American bandleader who asked for one in the 1890s?

The sousaphone was first built by J. W. Pepper in 1893 for John Philip Sousa, who was dissatisfied with the helicons used by the United States Marine Band.

Which jazz trumpeter nicknamed 'Satchmo' is also loved for singing 'What a Wonderful World' and 'La Vie en rose'?

Louis Armstrong's nickname is short for 'Satchelmouth'. He helped turn jazz from group improvisation into a soloist's art.

Which bugle call signals lights-out on American military bases and is sounded at military funerals?

Taps was arranged in its present form in 1862 by Union general Daniel Butterfield, replacing an older French lights-out call. It is sometimes known as Butterfield's Lullaby.

In Prokofiev's musical tale about a boy named Peter, which animal do three French horns portray?

The wolf gets three horns, while the bird is a flute, the duck an oboe and the cat a clarinet. Prokofiev wrote the piece in 1936 to introduce children to the orchestra.

In the Book of Joshua, the walls of which city fell after priests blew horns for seven days?

Jericho's walls fell, the story goes, when the people shouted on the seventh day. Seven priests had blown their horns on every daily march around the city.

Which Broadway musical about a travelling con artist has 'Seventy-Six Trombones' as its signature song?

The Music Man follows Harold Hill, who poses as a boys' band organiser, takes payment for instruments and uniforms, then plans to skip town.

Which boxing film's theme, 'Gonna Fly Now', opens with a blazing trumpet fanfare?

Rocky's theme reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1977. A cover by jazz trumpeter Maynard Ferguson made the top 30 as well.

Which Rossini overture ends with a gallop, heralded by trumpets, that became the Lone Ranger's theme?

William Tell contains no horses or cavalry charges at all. Its famous finale is often called the March of the Swiss Soldiers in English.

In which American city do brass bands lead jazz funerals, with dancing followers known as the second line?

New Orleans funeral bands play sombre dirges and hymns on the march, then turn to upbeat numbers such as When the Saints Go Marching In.

Which Mexican folk ensemble pairs two trumpets with violins and a big bass guitar called the guitarrón?

Mariachi groups only took up the trumpet as jazz and Cuban music grew popular, and its arrival pushed the violins into a secondary role.

Which archangel is popularly pictured blowing a trumpet blast to announce the end of time?

Gabriel is never actually named as the trumpeter in the Bible, which mentions a trumpet blast before the resurrection of the dead but not who sounds it.

Which Aboriginal Australian instrument is traditionally made from a eucalyptus trunk hollowed out by termites?

The didgeridoo counts as a brass instrument despite being wood, because it is sounded the same way as a trumpet. Makers knock on tree trunks to listen for a promising hollow.

Which instrument made from a ram's horn is blown in synagogues on Rosh Hashanah?

The shofar is also sounded at the end of Yom Kippur. A ram is preferred, but the Talmud allows the horn of any animal in the cattle family except a cow.

Which wooden horn, three to four metres long, did herders use to signal between high pastures and the valley floor?

The alphorn's call can carry for several kilometres, and it was even used to gather scattered herds. Brahms worked a melody he heard on one into his First Symphony.

Which trumpeter led the album Kind of Blue, regarded by many critics as the greatest jazz album ever recorded?

Miles Davis shaped his hushed 1950s sound by playing through a Harmon mute placed close to the microphone, with spacious, relaxed phrasing.

Which bebop trumpeter was famous for his pouched cheeks and a horn bent upward by accident at a party?

Dizzy Gillespie liked the sound of the damaged trumpet so much that he had one specially made with its end raised 45 degrees, and it became his trademark.

Which trombone-playing big band leader vanished on a flight over the English Channel in December 1944?

Glenn Miller was serving as a wartime officer leading a military band, and his plane never arrived in France. His theme song was Moonlight Serenade.

Which trumpeter, leader of the Tijuana Brass, is the 'A' in A&M Records, the label he co-founded?

Herb Alpert started the label with Jerry Moss, who supplied the M. His only number-one single of the Tijuana Brass years was a rare vocal, This Guy's in Love with You.

Which trumpeter became the first jazz musician to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music, for Blood on the Fields?

Wynton Marsalis won it in 1997 for an oratorio. At 22 he had already won Grammy Awards for both jazz and classical recordings in the same year.

Which singing trio introduced 'Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy' in the Abbott and Costello film Buck Privates?

The Andrews Sisters took their recording to number six in the US. Decades later it inspired Christina Aguilera's tribute single Candyman.

Which American composer wrote Fanfare for the Common Man for the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra in wartime 1942?

Aaron Copland wrote it after conductor Eugene Goossens asked American composers for fanfares to open wartime concerts. It is the only one that has stayed in the standard repertoire.

In a children's novel by the author of Charlotte's Web, which voiceless animal learns to play the trumpet?

A swan born without a voice is the hero of The Trumpet of the Swan, published in 1970. He takes up the instrument to impress a female named Serena.

Which Christian charity, founded in Victorian London, became famous for the brass bands at its street meetings?

The Salvation Army's first players were Charles Fry and his three sons, a brass quartet who began performing at its outdoor meetings in 1878.

Which compact, mellower-toned cousin of the trumpet was the instrument of early jazz pioneer Buddy Bolden?

Cornet tubing widens gradually from the mouthpiece, which makes it more agile than a trumpet in fast passages. A British brass band has ten of them.

Which mellow, wide-bore relative of the trumpet did Chuck Mangione play on his 1977 title track Feels So Good?

The flugelhorn takes its name from the German Flügel, meaning wing or flank. Mangione gave up the trumpet in the 1970s to concentrate on it alone.

Which tenor-voiced band instrument takes its name from an Ancient Greek word meaning 'sweet-voiced'?

Euphonium comes from euphonos, also translated as pleasant-sounding. British composers sometimes call the instrument the tenor tuba.

By which English name was the trombone known during the Renaissance, before its present name caught on?

Sackbut was originally a French term, and it stayed in use in England until the instrument itself fell out of favour there in the eighteenth century.

Which German opera composer commissioned a new horn-tuba hybrid for the orchestra of his four-part Ring cycle?

Richard Wagner wanted a sound to bridge the gap between the French horns and the trombones. The instrument that resulted is usually played by horn players.

Which Austrian composer wrote a famous 1796 concerto to show off Anton Weidinger's new keyed trumpet?

Joseph Haydn was 64 when he wrote it, and he filled it with melodies in the middle and low registers that only the new instrument could manage.

The wedding favourite Trumpet Voluntary, long credited to Henry Purcell, was written by which English composer?

Jeremiah Clarke wrote it around 1700 as the Prince of Denmark's March. It was played at the 1981 wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer.

Which term do brass players use for the way they shape the mouth and facial muscles to play?

Embouchure comes from the French word bouche, meaning mouth. Teachers give differing, even contradictory, advice on it, because teeth and jaw shape vary from player to player.

The most common type of trumpet, which sounds a whole step lower than written, is pitched in which key?

B-flat trumpets contain about 1.48 metres of tubing. The tiny piccolo trumpet is pitched in the same key, a full octave higher.

Most French horns use which kind of valve, worked by levers, where a trumpet has pistons?

Rotary valves are standard on most horns, though the Vienna horn keeps its own double-piston design and some older horns use pistons like a trumpet's.

Bronze Age horns once sunk in bogs are pictured on the packaging of which European butter brand?

Lurpak is named after the lur, a bronze horn that can reach two metres in length. Most surviving examples were found in Denmark, often in pairs.

Which Scottish actor plays Andy, the band's tenor horn player, in the 1996 British film Brassed Off?

Ewan McGregor's character loses his horn in a bet and has to whistle his part until he wins it back at pool. The real Grimethorpe Colliery Band recorded the film's music.