by Winifred York
Some of the all time greatest jazz musicians played brass wind instruments. Picture yourself sitting in the audience as those brass instruments start to blow. Are you looking back to the days of Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie and Roy Eldridge? These musicians were some of the biggest influences in modern jazz history and they did it all with their brass wind instruments.
Brass wind instruments deliver a sound unto themselves. Most are fitted with a removable mouthpiece. This enables the musician to use different mouthpieces to make different sounds. A player can also change the sound by changing the tension of the lips on the mouthpiece. This is called embouchure. It deals with the amount of tension the mouth puts on the mouthpiece. Most musicians use this technique. The better they are with it the more they can put into it. For example, the jaw and lower facial muscles can be used as well as the tongue to manipulate the use of the air as the player blows into the mouthpiece to make the sounds they are striving for.
The instruments that fall into the category of brass wind instruments include the trumpet, cornet, trombone, tuba and French horn. A couple of these have some unusual facts about them. The French horn has one very interesting oddity about it. It is the only brass instrument that is played only left-handed. Then there's the trombone. It was invented in Italy, in Italian trombone means big trumpet, though originally it had a french name which meant to push and pull. The marching tuba, called the sousaphone after its inventor John Phillip Sousa, actually winds itself completely around the body of the musician.
There’s more bad music in jazz than any other form. Maybe that’s because the audience doesn’t really know what’s happening.
—Pat Metheny (b. 1954)
A handy method of altering the sound of any brass instrument is the use of what is called a mute. This device works to change the sound by affecting the flow of air. This device comes in three types starting with the straight mute that makes the sound higher, then the harmon mute that is used primarily in jazz to make those soulful sounds and lastly the cup mute that makes the sound softer.
Back to those days of watching Louis Armstrong, the great Satchmo himself, up on stage blowing that trumpet, the sweat pouring down his face as he used his trademark handkerchief to wipe it. He was, with his unique style and amazing stage presence, the man who took jazz into the realm of a popular musical genre. Likely the most famous trumpeter of his time he also opened the doors for many of the jazz musicians who have come to fame over the years.
What about the innovative trumpeting of John Gillespie, Dizzy Gillespie to his fans, another jazz trumpeter who made big changes with his important influence on the growth of bebop. He was also known for his unusual trumpet. Damaged by accident, the bottom, known as the bell, became bent at a forty-five degree angle instead of lying straight. This odd shape changed the sound of the trumpet and he came to prefer it that way.
Roy Eldrige was another jazz trumpeter who really knew how to blow his instrument! Known for his influences in jazz he is credited as the link between Armstrong's swing music and Gillespie's bebop.
Compare the history of the novel to that of rock ‘n’ roll. Both started out a minority taste, became a mass taste, and then splintered into several subgenres. Both have been the typical cultural expressions of classes and epochs. Both started out aggressively fighting for their share of attention, novels attacking the drama, the tract, and the poem, rock attacking jazz and pop and rolling over classical music.
—W. T. Lhamon, U. S. educator, critic. “Material Differences,” Deliberate Speed: The Origins of a Cultural Style in the American 1950s, Smithsonian (1990)
Then there were the trombonists. Who will ever forget Tommy Dorsey and his famous hit The Boogie Woogie. He was not only an exceptional jazz trombonist but also a bandleader in the age of the Big Bands. The Big Bands can be traced back to Glenn Miller, bandleader and trombonist. Then there was J. J. Johnson, his trombone made him famous for his unique bebop style. When naming someone of the great brass instrument players who could forget Miles Davis. This man was an incredible musician responsible for many new styles of jazz. He was an exceptional accomplished trendsetter who blew his trumpet into the annals of jazz history. It seems worth including amongst these greats Doc Severinson, a talented trumpet player who played with many of the big bands before becoming the bandleader for the Tonight Show from 1967 until retiring in 1992.
So sit back, close you eyes and listen to those trumpets blow!!!