Book Description

Trumpets have been a part of human culture since before there were humans. They have served as expressions of emotion, tools of the hunter-gatherer, tools of the warrior, and ultimately once again as a means of expressing that emotion from deep within the human soul that manifests as music. To look at how the trumpet has transformed in its role in human society is to look at how human society itself has transformed. And, as a material object once adapted from nature, but which took new forms as the successive technologies of metalworking, component sub-assembly fabrication, machining, high-force mechanical forming and ultimately automation transformed the abilities of humans to make objects for their use, it is a microcosm of human technological and socio-economic evolution.To collect and study examples of every form the trumpet has taken since the time when proto-human tools were limited to a choicely shaped rock up to the present day would be prohibitively expensive and practically impossible - as examples simply no longer exist. However, with cursory examination of the first 99% of said history, the evolution of the trumpet in modern times provides an excellent case study into how the forces of human cultural, religious, political, material and technological change interact with one another and manifest in a relatively simple and clearly defined element of our culture. Therefore, the bulk of what follows is focused on the piston valve trumpet and the time period during which chromatic trumpets rose to prominence in popular music, became ubiquitous in the schools following the advent of music education, and are now moving to a less prominent role once again as the popular genre moves into the age of electronic music.To that end, what follows is more a timeline of events and physical manifestations than a socio-cultural analysis - though the author has ventured to offer an opinion or ten along the way. The reader should feel free to question assertions made, and to treat this as an archeological data set as much as a history.