Trumpets and other high brass: a history inspired by the Joe R. and Joella F. Utley Collection

Abstract

"Instruments of the single harmonic series traces the development of high brass instruments without valves or keys from antiquity through the heyday of the natural trumpet to the twentieth century Baroque trumpet revival. It provides a complete photographic and descriptive record of this section of the Utley Collection and includes technical drawings, acoustical measurements, drawings of structural details, and x-ray imaging. Not a catalog in the narrow sense, this volume uses examples from the Utley collection along with many from public and private collections, extensive archival research, primary source documents and iconographic references to illustrate the major steps in this development. It sheds new light on the history of these instruments and on the biographies, working conditions and social status of their makers. Volume 1 covers ethnic instruments from many cultures, the emergence of the trumpet in Europe, and the dominant trumpet designs of the sixteenth through eighteenth centuries. The inclusion of a great variety of military and signal trumpets, bugles, and such oddities as bicycle bugles and walking-stick trumpets, paints a richer and more comprehensive picture than is usually seen in the literature. More than 800 color photographs bring the subject to life, as does an accompanying DVD with musical examples played on instruments from the Utley Collection, by specialists such as Barry Bauguess, Richard Seraphinof, and Crispian Steele-Perkins"--Provided by publisher.

Contents

Introduction -- Found in nature : horns and trumpets made of organic material -- Prehistoric, ancient, and ethnic trumpets and signal horns made of metal -- Early traces of the European trumpet -- Establishing the standards in trumpet design in the sixteenth century, and continued experiments -- Heyday of the natural trumpet in seventeenth and eighteenth centuries : Nuremberg rules the market -- New designs in the Nuremberg trumpet makers' workshops n the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries -- The English counterpart -- Activities in other parts of Europe -- Bugles, hunting and post horns, fanfare and signal trumpets -- Early trumpet mutes -- A brief mention of timpani -- The revival of the baroque trumpet -- Appendix I-A : A checklist of instruments of the single harmonic series in the Joe R. and Joella F. Utley Collection -- Appendix I-B : Index of NMM inventory numbers for the Utley collection instruments in this volume -- Appendix II : Trompetenmacher Ordnung in Nürnberg : trumpet makers ordinance in Nuremberg.