David Golberg wrote: This makes for a curious Google experience. There is a U.S. patent (#4993303) by this name. See a description - no photo, too bad - of a brass instrument at http://www.freepatentsonline.com/4993303.html
David, you can download the patent itself at freepatentsonline (you have to open a free account), or you can do it at www.patentfetcher.com. You can also look at the patent itself (albeit one page at a time) at www.uspto.gov, if you have a TIFF viewer installed. The drawings of the patent show something that looks like a flugelhorn, with a set of piston valves that are operated with the *left* hand. According to the description (see e.g. the "Summary of the invention"), the instrument is supposed to be like a flugelhorn "but larger" and "pitched in the key of F alto with a conversion to B-flat thereby allowing a full range of notes to be played...The bell is similar in size to that of a tenor trombone and therefore does not require the musician to hold his hand in the bell to control the high register. This allows the instrument to be played without muffling...The instrument uses a French Horn lead pipe...." In other words, this is supposed to be a forward-facing French Horn, but with a smaller bell (or conversely, a compact, valved trombone that has a French Horn leadpipe). Seems to me if you want a trombone, just build a trombone. :-) Dan Feigelson ____________________________________________________________________________________ Sucker-punch spam with award-winning protection. Try the free Yahoo! Mail Beta. http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/mailbeta/features_spam.html _______________________________________________ post: horn@music.memphis.edu unsubscribe or set options at http://music2.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/archive%40jab.org
