The Brass Section

To effectively change pitch on a valve brass instrument, two things come into play: the pressing of valves to effectively change the length of the tubing, and the player's lip aperture or "embouchure" setting, which determines the frequency of the pulsed air or vibrations into the instrument.

The view of most scholars is that the term "brass instrument" should be defined by the way the sound is made, as above, and not by whether the instrument is actually made of brass. Thus, as exceptional cases one finds brass instruments made of wood, like the alphorn, the coronet, and the serpent, while many of woodwind instruments are made of brass, like the saxophone.

Modern brass instruments generally come in one of two families:

Valve brass instruments use a set of valves (typically 3 or 4 but as many as 7 or more in some cases) operated by the player's fingers that introduce additional tubing into the instrument, changing its overall length. This family includes all of the modern brass instruments except the trombone: the trumpet, french horn, euphonium, and tuba, as well as the, flugelhorn, baritone horn, sousaphone, mellophone, and the old saxhorn. As valve instruments are predominant among the brasses today, a more thorough discussion of their workings can be found below. The valves are usually piston valves, but can be rotary valves. Rotary valves are the norm for the horn and are also prevalent on the tuba.

Slide brass instruments use a slide to change the length of tubing. The main instruments in this category are the trombone family, though valve trombones are occasionally used, especially in jazz. The trombone family's ancestor the sackbut and the folk instrument bazooka are also in the slide family.

There are two other families that have now become functionally obsolete for practical purposes, though instruments of both types are sometimes used for period-instrument performances of Baroque- or Classical-era pieces.

Natural brass instruments, where the player can only play notes in the instrument's harmonic series, for example the bugle. The trumpet was a natural brass instrument prior to about 1795, and the horn before about 1820. Natural instruments are still played for some ceremonial functions, as well as period performances.

Keyed or Fingered brass instruments used holes along the body of the instrument, which were covered by fingers or by finger-operated pads (keys) in a similar way to a woodwind instrument. These included the coronet, serpent, ophicleide and keyed trumpet. They are more difficult to play than valve instruments.

Trumpet

Anna Collen

Bob Counihan

Sal Crispino

Jim Dempsey
Ellen Eisenberg

Jeff Greenwood
Russ Klussendorf
Dick Prettyman
Peter Riggins

French Horn

Mitch Friedman

Kristen Martin

Gary Mau

Debra Parisi

Sue Zetoff

Baritone

Christine Apruzese

Chester Majewski

Larry Siren

Trombone

Joe Jacob

Scott Kern *
Lou Kiefer

Bill Kirkwood *

Karla McClain *
Chris Sayer

Diane Smith *
Russ Sweet

Tuba

Jim Crawford
Ernie Gardow

Robert Bonner

* Visiting Player