It is very easy to get confused about trumpets in F and Eb. Don't
forget that a lot of the 19th century music written for the long
orchestral valved trumpets in F and Eb is written in the upper octave -
so actually, the transposition is the same as todays small F and Eb
trumpet and cornet - even if the effective ranges of the instruments are
not the same.
An exception would be the F alto trumpet of Rimsky-K and the
Shostakovich First Symphony, which is actually the same length as the
long, orchestral valve F trumpet of the 19th century, but larger bore
and mouthpiece, and written in the lower octave.
The problem with voice designations "alto" tenor" etc, is that nearly
all instruments exceed them.
In the case of low trumpets, "alto" works the best for low trumpets in F
and Eb. "Tenor" would for the best for low (tenor trombone-range)
trumpets in C and Bb. These are commonly called "bass trumpets", but
they are nothing of the sort in timbre or range, and this leaves no room
below. Roger Bobo used to play a "contrabass trumpet" in an LA Phil
quintet years ago - (I never heard it, only saw it listed on recordings)
my guess is that was in F - which would normally be a "bass" range.
Brass Bands call the little Eb cornet the "soprano cornet" and the Bb
just the "cornet." I've seen the "mezzo-soprano" designation given to
the Bb instrument, on occasion. Of course, they call the Eb horn the
"tenor" and Americans call it an "alto horn." Any reasonable look at
the range would say the Brits are closer.
Raymond Horton
Bass Trombone (the difference here is timbre more so than range)
Louisville Orchestra
John Howell wrote:
At 1:40 PM -0400 6/6/07, Andrew Stiller wrote:
On Jun 6, 2007, at 8:23 AM, Christopher Smith wrote:
On Jun 5, 2007, at 9:37 PM, John Howell wrote:
At 11:17 AM -0400 6/5/07, Christopher Smith wrote:
I WOULD like to see Trumpet in Eb in the instrument list. When I
do orchestra transcriptions from the 19th C, there is a lot of Eb
trumpet, and I got caught the first time.
But were these Eb alto, same pitch as the British brass band solo
Eb cornet, or Eb basso, like the low F trumpet that was also common?
High Eb is what I meant, between the piccolo and the Bb in size,
like the British Eb cornet. Very common instrument. I wouldn't call
that pitch Eb alto, as I would reserve that name for the alto horn
transposition.
Apologies. I adopted the French horn terminology automatically,
simply meaning the upper octave Eb instrument and the lower octave Eb
instrument. I do like Andrew's "tenor trumpet" as a much better
descriptive term.
John
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