Soprano trombone?

[PaulT]

[Edited for clarity.]

My trumpet playing son asked me to keep my eyes peeled for a soprano trombone. I have heard of alto trombones (which sound like fun) but I have heard no mention of soprano trombones here or elsewhere. Google informed that they do exist.

- Are they as fun and functional as an alto bone or do they push the envelope too far (losing both musicality and playability?)

- Are there relatively inexpensive soprano trombones , perhaps a p-bone (or similar) available that work well enough and are safely beyond the "toy" category? (So, far, I have not located any.)

- He is interested in an instrument that he can use one of his trumpet mouthpieces in. Or, if that is not feasible or desirable, a mouthpiece that isn't drastically different than a 1.5 Bach type.

- Can a trumpet-sized mouthpiece be used in an alto trombone?

[BGuttman]

p-Bone would be a plastic instrument pitched an octave above the regular(tenor) P-Bone. I've never seen one.

There are a number of brass soprano trombones or slide trumpets around. Some of them can be pretty pricey, but there are some that are low cost and playable. Of the Chinese ones I'd look at Wessex Tubas or Mack Brass.

[Gary]

Paul, please see your email.

[PaulT]

I edited the title to remove "p-bone". What my son is interested in is a soprano trombone and he wants to be able to use his trumpet mouthpiece in it (or a mouthpiece that is similar in feel and size to his 1.5-equivalent trumpet mouthpieces).

I put "P-Bone" in the title thinking that perhaps P-Bone made a soprano trombone.

- Do soprano trombones use mouthpieces that are "trumpet-sized"?

- are there "trumpet-sized" mouthpieces that work with alto trombones? (that work well with alto trombones?)

Thanks

[BGuttman]

In answer to your first question, most soprano trombones and slide trumpets use trumpet mouthpieces.

Some alto trombones (particularly the Olds in F) take mouthpieces for Eb alto horns, which are only slightly larger than trumpet mouthpieces. Most of the common ones use small shank trombone mouthpieces, though.

If I were your son I'd go for the soprano trombone and use my trumpet mouthpiece on it.

[PaulT]

Thanks, Bruce.

[PaulT]

[LeTromboniste]

Just for the record because it's one of my pet peeves...to the risk of coming across as pedantic, a soprano trombone is not a slide trumpet. There have been a number of instruments that were equipped with some sort of slide, yet were still in essence trumpets. A soprano trombone is in essence a trombone, just a very small one.

[PaulT]

Is the Jupiter 314L (discontinued) a step above the $300 Chinese horns on ebay and elsewhere?

[Finetales]

Just for the record because it's one of my pet peeves...to the risk of coming across as pedantic, a soprano trombone is not a slide trumpet. There have been a number of instruments that were equipped with some sort of slide, yet were still in essence trumpets. A soprano trombone is in essence a trombone, just a very small one.

The distinction is important, but most modern sopranos (the Chinese ones etc.) ARE still in essence trumpets, right down to using a trumpet bell and receiver. It's one of the reasons most of them aren't good, and probably one of the reasons soprano gets a bad rep so much. A modern "soprano trombone" played with a trumpet mouthpiece sounds exactly like a trumpet because it essentially is one, so although the modern "slide trumpet" is pretty different from a historical one, I think the name is still appropriate. To get one to actually sound like a soprano trombone that belongs on top of a trombone choir instead of just a trumpet that can gliss (which is what it is), you have to get pretty creative with mouthpieces.

Kanstul actually sells both - the model 140 is sold as a slide trumpet and has a 72 trumpet bell, while the 150 is sold as a soprano trombone and has a larger throat bell, but I don't know if the 150's bell is also from one of their trumpets or not.

It's one of my pet peeves too, because I wish somebody would make an affordable soprano that's actually a soprano.

(There used to be "slide cornets" as well, which were the same as the manufacturer's "slide trumpet" but with a cornet receiver (but the same amount of cylindrical tubing). So even less accurate!)

[heinzgries]

if you search a real small mouthpiece for alto, take a look here

http://www.cathermusic.com/subpage9.html

[JohnL]

if you search a real small mouthpiece for alto, take a look here

http://www.cathermusic.com/subpage9.html

I know a guy who uses a Cather mouthpiece for his alto; he's happy with it.

The Olds F alto is an odd duck (though not as odd as their Eb alto) and uses a special mouthpiece. It's a bit larger than the typical alto horn/mellophone mouthpiece (though those can be used) and definitely smaller than a typical tenor trombone mouthpiece. More trumpet-ish than the typical modern alto, to be sure. I've only used mine in performance one, to cover a minimal third trumpet part on one piece for a community orchestra concert.

[TheSheriff]

The distinction is important, but most modern sopranos (the Chinese ones etc.) ARE still in essence trumpets, right down to using a trumpet bell and receiver. It's one of the reasons most of them aren't good, and probably one of the reasons soprano gets a bad rep so much. A modern "soprano trombone" played with a trumpet mouthpiece sounds exactly like a trumpet because it essentially is one, so although the modern "slide trumpet" is pretty different from a historical one, I think the name is still appropriate. To get one to actually sound like a soprano trombone that belongs on top of a trombone choir instead of just a trumpet that can gliss (which is what it is), you have to get pretty creative with mouthpieces.

Kanstul actually sells both - the model 140 is sold as a slide trumpet and has a 72 trumpet bell, while the 150 is sold as a soprano trombone and has a larger throat bell, but I don't know if the 150's bell is also from one of their trumpets or not.

It's one of my pet peeves too, because I wish somebody would make an affordable soprano that's actually a soprano.

(There used to be "slide cornets" as well, which were the same as the manufacturer's "slide trumpet" but with a cornet receiver (but the same amount of cylindrical tubing). So even less accurate!)

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Would you please talk a bit more as to what constitutes a soprano trombone?

Thanks

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[Finetales]

Would you please talk a bit more as to what constitutes a soprano trombone?

Thanks

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I don't know nearly enough about flares and bore profiles to know how different a "real" soprano trombone would be from a typical soprano/slide trumpet in construction. And I'm sure there are plenty of "real" ones out there...for instance, I don't imagine anyone has paid several thousand dollars for a Thein soprano only to find out they just raided their trumpet parts bin and stuck a slide on it. I just know that I have heard a genuine soprano trombone sound and it is very far from the strident trumpet sound you get with your typical Chinese soprano trombone/slide trumpet. I know Jim Nova sparingly uses a soprano in his Star Wars multitracks, and it's hard (if not impossible) to tell when the high notes are alto or soprano. I forgot what kind of soprano and mouthpiece he uses, I asked him once. Regardless, the modern, cheap sopranos I was referring to (that are by far the most common, because of how cheap they are) sound only like trumpets and don't have an ounce of trombone sound in them when played with the mouthpiece they were designed for. As we all know a bass trumpet sounds distinct from a trombone so I don't think it's just down to it being the length of a trumpet that it sounds like a trumpet.

I do think a big part of it is mouthpiece selection. I think you would be able to get a convincing soprano trombone sound using a Bach 3439AT alto trumpet (or "contralto" in Bach-speak) mouthpiece, because I've heard someone use one on a normal trumpet and it sounded shockingly trombone-like. But when the instrument is designed for standard trumpet mouthpieces and uses a standard existing trumpet bell, even if you can coax a more trombone-like sound out of them with an unorthodox mouthpiece choice I think you can pretty safely say that they are more trumpets than trombones.

That's just my opinion though. I generally refer to all 4.5' slide instruments as soprano trombones, I just think that in this case "slide trumpet" is also an acceptable term for them because a trumpet with a slide is pretty much exactly what they are.

[TheSheriff]

Would you please talk a bit more as to what constitutes a soprano trombone?

Thanks

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I don't know nearly enough about flares and bore profiles to know how different a "real" soprano trombone would be from a typical soprano/slide trumpet in construction. And I'm sure there are plenty of "real" ones out there...for instance, I don't imagine anyone has paid several thousand dollars for a Thein soprano only to find out they just raided their trumpet parts bin and stuck a slide on it. I just know that I have heard a genuine soprano trombone sound and it is very far from the strident trumpet sound you get with your typical Chinese soprano trombone/slide trumpet. I know Jim Nova sparingly uses a soprano in his Star Wars multitracks, and it's hard (if not impossible) to tell when the high notes are alto or soprano. I forgot what kind of soprano and mouthpiece he uses, I asked him once. Regardless, the modern, cheap sopranos I was referring to (that are by far the most common, because of how cheap they are) sound only like trumpets and don't have an ounce of trombone sound in them when played with the mouthpiece they were designed for. As we all know a bass trumpet sounds distinct from a trombone so I don't think it's just down to it being the length of a trumpet that it sounds like a trumpet.

I do think a big part of it is mouthpiece selection. I think you would be able to get a convincing soprano trombone sound using a Bach 3439AT alto trumpet (or "contralto" in Bach-speak) mouthpiece, because I've heard someone use one on a normal trumpet and it sounded shockingly trombone-like. But when the instrument is designed for standard trumpet mouthpieces and uses a standard existing trumpet bell, even if you can coax a more trombone-like sound out of them with an unorthodox mouthpiece choice I think you can pretty safely say that they are more trumpets than trombones.

That's just my opinion though. I generally refer to all 4.5' slide instruments as soprano trombones, I just think that in this case "slide trumpet" is also an acceptable term for them because a trumpet with a slide is pretty much exactly what they are.

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Thanks for that!

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[Doubler]

An interesting discussion on this subject can be found here: http://www.trumpetmaster.com/threads/so ... one.89038/

[LeTromboniste]

To me it has nothing to do with the parts that are used actually. Yes a soprano trombone that is made with trumpet parts not designed to work as that setup is lazy, and it probably won't give as satisfactory results as using parts designed specifically for that purpose, but that's not the point. A bass trumpet made using trombone or baritone parts wouldn't be a trombone or a baritone, it would still be a trumpet. A trombone is not defined by its dimensions or proportions of conical vs cylindrical tubing either, case in point, a sackbut, a french romantic peashooter, a large bore, large bell romantic german trombone and a modern american tromobne are all very different in that regard, yet they are all indisputably trombones.

The point is more that the soprano trombone evolved from the trombone family, not the trumpet. It is born out of the idea of expanding the family the same way that the contra does in the other direction, not out of equipping the trumpet with a slide. It shares every defining characteristic of other members of the trombone family, and the few characteristics it does share with the trumpet are also shared by the other members of the trombone family as part of the larger family of cylindrical brass instruments. The only thing that really makes it similar to a trumpet and distinguishes it from other trombones is the pitch/range it's in and the fact that it is typically played by trumpet players using trumpet mouthpieces. But in the 19th century when trumpet players were playing much larger mouthpieces and alto trombone mouthpieces were much smaller, alto trombone was very often played by trumpet players, and the mouthpieces were described as being virtually the same. Yet nobody would claim that the alto trombone is or was then a "slide trumpet".

There have been a number of attempts to equip trumpets with slides prior to valves being invented or around the time of their invention, the earliest with single telescoping tube (which in turn eventually birthed the trombone, but is still a trumpet), later with double slides that move in various directions, such as the Flatt trumpet of Purcell's time, or the 19th century slide trumpet that Mendelssohn was likely familiar with and wrote for. None of these are trombone and would be recognizable as trombones by anyone. They are all trumpets, are recognizable in form as trumpets (you usually would think at first glance they are simply natural or invention trumpets until you saw a player move the slide), and function essentially as trumpets have (or had until then) - they are evolutions of the trumpet whose aim is to provide some extra notes and facilitate intonation, in the same way that valves were an evolution to give more notes to the instrument and eventually make it chromatic. All of these are in essence trumpets, and have some form of slide, and are thus described as slide trumpets.

[TheSheriff]

To me it has nothing to do with the parts that are used actually. Yes a soprano trombone that is made with trumpet parts not designed to work as that setup is lazy, and it probably won't give as satisfactory results as using parts designed specifically for that purpose, but that's not the point. A bass trumpet made using trombone or baritone parts wouldn't be a trombone or a baritone, it would still be a trumpet. A trombone is not defined by its dimensions or proportions of conical vs cylindrical tubing either, case in point, a sackbut, a french romantic peashooter, a large bore, large bell romantic german trombone and a modern american tromobne are all very different in that regard, yet they are all indisputably trombones.

The point is more that the soprano trombone evolved from the trombone family, not the trumpet. It is born out of the idea of expanding the family the same way that the contra does in the other direction, not out of equipping the trumpet with a slide. It shares every defining characteristic of other members of the trombone family, and the few characteristics it does share with the trumpet are also shared by the other members of the trombone family as part of the larger family of cylindrical brass instruments. The only thing that really makes it similar to a trumpet and distinguishes it from other trombones is the pitch/range it's in and the fact that it is typically played by trumpet players using trumpet mouthpieces. But in the 19th century when trumpet players were playing much larger mouthpieces and alto trombone mouthpieces were much smaller, alto trombone was very often played by trumpet players, and the mouthpieces were described as being virtually the same. Yet nobody would claim that the alto trombone is or was then a "slide trumpet".

There have been a number of attempts to equip trumpets with slides prior to valves being invented or around the time of their invention, the earliest with single telescoping tube (which in turn eventually birthed the trombone, but is still a trumpet), later with double slides that move in various directions, such as the Flatt trumpet of Purcell's time, or the 19th century slide trumpet that Mendelssohn was likely familiar with and wrote for. None of these are trombone and would be recognizable as trombones by anyway. They are all trumpets, are recognizable in form as trumpets (you usually would think at first glance they are simply natural or invention trumpets until you saw a player move the slide), and function essentially as trumpets have (or had) - they are evolutions of the trumpet whose aim is to provide some extra notes and facilitate intonation, in the same way that valves were an evolution to give more notes to the instrument and eventually make it chromatic. All of these care in essence trumpet, and have some form of slide, and are thus described as slide trumpets.

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Great post, Max. Thank you.

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