Print out free sheet music notes for trumpet
Here you will find my trumpet scores! Right now you will find easy public domain melodies, Christmas carols and a few melodies with piano accompaniment. The melodies are free to use without any obligations! The files are in PDF format and you can download a PDF reader for free on the Internet!
Easy trumpet
Free sheet music for easy trumpet with arrangements for beginners with chord symbols for C-instruments above the notes. Popular melodies like Amazing Grace, El Condor Pasa, Fur Elise, Love Me Tender, Morning Has Broken and Happy Birthday To You.
Christmas trumpet
Free Christmas trumpet sheet music. Popular Christmas carols like Angels We Have Heard On High, Deck The Halls, Jingle Bells, O Holy Night, Silent Night and We Wish You A Merry Christmas.
Trumpet - piano
Trumpet scores with piano accompaniment. Printable PDF music scores for easy trumpet including La Paloma.
History and Development of the Trumpet
By Clint McLaughlin
It has been said that to know your past is to see your future. Most trumpet
players know very little about the history of the trumpet. The Conch Trumpet
was invented when a fisherman blew a sea animal out of a shell and it made
a noise. It was mostly a voice distorter. They shouted into it. Shell trumpets
are still used today. On Madagascar they are used for religious services.
In France they are blown on Easter Sunday.
Hollow log trumpets date
back to 2000 B.C., some are hollowed out by hand while others are made from
branches or trunks which were eaten by ants. In Africa they are mostly side
blown and play two notes. Along the Amazon they make a conical trumpet out
of rolled bark. It is 12-20 feet long. The Aborigines of Australia play
the Didgeridoo made from branches 4 or 5 feet long. The player blows and
mumbles at the same time. This can produce thousands of different sounds.
The Shofar, made from a ram horn and the Hatzotzeroth, made of metal,
are both mentioned in the Bible. They were used to blow down the walls of
Jericho. They are still used on certain religious days. The Roman Cornu,
originally made of horns and later metal, was made in several sections and
about 10 feet long. Two were found in Pompeii.
The trumpets of Asia
were made from bamboo, bones, or metal. In Tibet it was made from a human
femur covered in human skin and ending in a copper bell. The Pungacuqua
was made by the natives of Mexico out of clay. The tomb of King Tut had
two metal trumpets in it. They were 23 inches long.
The Lur, a bronze
8 foot long "S" shaped horn, dates back to 1000 B.C. It could play up to
the 12th partial. The Salpinx was a straight trumpet 62 inches long, made
of bone or bronze. Salpinx contests were a part of the original Olympic
Games.
The Alphorn is still used today. You've seen them on television
in a cough medicine commercial. They are "J" shaped, made in two sections,
and 5-13 feet long. Alphorns can play from the 2nd to the 16th partial,
and are used for signaling as well as a call for prayer in the Catholic
Church.
The wooden Cornetto had six finger holes and was chromatic
for one full octave. The Serpent (a large Cornetto) also had six finger
holes, but because of its larger size, it had a chromatic range of two and
one-half octaves.
During the 1400's trumpets in Europe were made
of brass. They used either 70% copper and 30% zinc or 85% copper and 15%
zinc, giving a more mellow sound. During this time trumpet players were
used in watch towers as lookouts. They watched for fire and advancing armies.
These lookout players were called Thurmers. King Henry VIII had a corps
of fifteen trumpets and ten sackbuts. In 1571 Queen Elizabeth used eighteen
trumpets and six sackbuts. During the coronation of Christian IV of Denmark
in 1588 there were sixty-four trumpeters used.
The extra use of
the trumpet brought about many changes. One of these changes was the slide
trumpet. The mouthpiece was connected so that it could be pulled out up
to twenty-two inches. This lowered the pitch by a third. The modern version
of this would be the MF Firebird by Holton, which uses both valves and a
slide.
The Natural Trumpet or Baroque Trumpet was the most popular
trumpet during the Baroque period. It was a long, cylindrical tube built
in a loop which flared out into a bell that was four to four and one-half
inches across. The Natural Trumpet in "F" was six feet long and had slides
and crooks, or extensions to change the key to E, Eb, D & C. The keys
of B, Bb, A & Ab could be played by combining crooks. The D trumpet
was the most popular. It was seven feet long. The range of the Natural Trumpet
in "D" was from D to a3, which is its 24th partial. No one player could
play the entire range of the trumpet. The range was divided into four parts;
Clarino, Second Clarino, Tromba & Principal. Each range required a different
mouthpiece, as well as a different trumpet. The Clarino player used a trumpet
which had a very small bore, or inside diameter. He played a very, very
shallow cup shaped mouthpiece with a wide rim. As the range lowered, the
players used larger and deeper mouthpieces. The Principal Players used trumpets
with a very large bore size and deep mouthpieces. The Natural Trumpet was
not chromatic and could only play the notes in its own harmonic series.
That is why the crooks were so important. They were twice as long as modern
trumpets in the same key. That made it easier to play the same partial.
It also made the horn mellower than our modern version.
The stopping-Trumpet
was based on the hand stopping principle of the French Horn. By pushing
your hand into the bell (stopping) the pitch could be lowered. In order
to keep the instrument from being too long to use your hand in the bell,
curved crooks called inventions were used.
From the middle ages until
the 18th century every city had its own trumpeters who were responsible
to the municipal officers. The status of the trumpet player was codified.
The rivalry between court hired trumpet players and the tower watchmen was
so extreme that it caused a guild, or union, to be formed. The Hoftrompeter,
or court trumpeters belonged to a knightly class. They played ceremonial
music, accompanied chapel choirs and led the army into battle.
In
1787 William Shaw invented the vented trumpet. It had four vents which allowed
one key change without using crooks. Now only three crooks were necessary.
In 1801, Anton Weidinger and Joseph Riedl invented the keyed trumpet. In
1810, Joseph Halliday made the first Kent Keyed Bugle. Heinrich Stolzel
and Friedrich Blubmel invented a two valve trumpet in 1818. The valves were
square boxes made of copper. In 1824 John Shaw added springs to those valves
and C. A. Miller added a third valve.
The 1820's were very important.
The Flugelhorn was invented in Vienna and the three valve cornet as well.
Adolphe Sax invented ten different Sax horns in 1843. Each one had either
three or four valves. Wagner invented the Bass Trumpet for the "Ring of
the Nibelung". Late in the 1800's the Echo Trumpet was invented. It had
a non-detachable mute which was opened and closed with a valve.
The
modern trumpet in Bb is pitched a sixth above the Natural Trumpet in D.
It has three valves which, when depressed, changes the key of the horn by
making air go through additional tubing. The modern cornet is mellower,
warmer and more agile than the trumpet because of the use of more conical
than cylindrical tubing.
Clint 'Pops' McLaughlin
is a trumpet teacher with 35 years experience. Published articles in The
ITG Journal, Windplayer author of 12 books 7 videos and much more at:
http://www.BbTrumpet.com