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Seminar: "Trumpet Design: Procedures of Demythification" Dale Olsen
Wednesday, 5:15pm
Wayne Tanabe, Reviewer
Dale Olsen gave an informative seminar on the subject of giving a balanced evaluation of different trumpet design aspects including valve alignment; heavy valve caps; different materials used in bells; and other small items that manufacturers and after market companies provide players to change or adjust the playing characteristics of trumpets. Olsen pointed out that it is very important to not rely heavily upon myth. Myths were described as something not to believe but rather things unsubstantiated by unbiased testing procedures. Myths are passed along in many variations such as believing someone of fame making a statement, manufacturers bias used in their own advertisement, and many other factors not based in true evaluation It is very important to make evaluations based upon an "apples compared to apples" analysis. His example of this was players saying that silver plated trumpets always play brighter than their lacquer counterparts. He noted that nowhere did they take into account items like bore size, size of bell, or the overall design of the instrument to account for the brightness factor.
A part of the seminar also involved a short demonstration of the B.I.A.S. system, which is a computer analysation system used to evaluate all brass instruments. Using a sophisticated system to send an electronic signal through the instrument, a certain amount of useful data can be collected to give a tester an unbiased reference starting point for evaluation.
This was an interesting session with good information based on fair and unbiased testing allowing us to evaluate the choices we make when choosing all of the components that make up the trumpet. (Wayne Tanabe, The Brass Bow, Arlington Heights, Illinois) |
