On Jun 22, 2006, at 4:26 PM, Andrew Stiller wrote:
but even if it was missing the 2nd trigger (or even a straight horn!
I've seen them!) it would still be a bass trombone.
A simplex bass trombone is an instrument in F.
Did you mean to say G? I thought we had established that the F bass
trombone is called a contrabass, for no apparent reason.
Some orchestral bass trombonists (my former teacher among them) play a
straight bass trombone in Bb when they don't have to play below E under
the staff, because the straight air tube is more responsive and
resonant than the almost identical horn with the valves.
You might call it a tenor, but it has a bore, bell, lead pipe and
mouthpiece exactly like a bass trombone with triggers.
A "normal" bass trombone with one or two triggers is an instrument in
Bb with an F attachment. That is of course also true of the, let us
say, non-bass trombone. Unlike the old simplex instruments, the
trombone (notice I don't call it a tenor) and bass trombone are
virtually identical acoustically. They have the same range, play the
same notes in the same way from the same positions. The only
difference is that one is optimized for the performance of low notes,
and the other isn't. BFD.
I don't know what BFD means, but the fact of one being optimised for
low notes is fairly important, if not to you, then certainly for the
players. They specialise on one or the other from fairly early in their
training, and switching is not a fait accompli unless you have already
practiced the other one for a fairly long time.
Christopher
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