Playing

The F/Bb horn with whole-tone ascending 3rd valve

A different horn, a different approach: Francis Orval explores how an ascending 3rd valve reshapes technique, intonation and response.

By Francis Orval

The Wrong Brass?

Between blind fidelity and reckless modernisation, instrument substitutions force performers to decide when the score’s wording serves—or betrays—the music.

By Rudolf Lewy

An American trumpet player's impressions of european brass performances

An American trumpet player reflects on European brass traditions, comparing education, amateur practice and professional performance across both continents.

By Harold E. Krueger

Brass players athletes

Brass players are athletes. Bengt Belfrage reveals how training, recovery, breathing, and mental focus—borrowed from sport—can transform performance and endurance.

By Bengt Belfrage

Vassily Gueorguievitch Brandt (1869–1923)

Biography

Sélianine traces Brandt’s life and artistry, from Bolshoi virtuoso to influential pedagogue, revealing the foundations of a distinctly Russian trumpet tradition.

By Anatoly Selianin

Part 1

The Haydn Trumpet Concerto

As editions, instruments and traditions diverge, Haydn’s trumpet concerto becomes a lens on notation, style and the shifting meaning of performance.

By Alfred Willener

Collective improvisation in instrumental classes with different instruments

What if learning an instrument meant more than playing pieces? Roland Böckle promotes collective improvisation to develop listening, taste, and creativity.

By Roland Böckle

Jazz and the Horn Series • Part 1

Jazz and the Horn

The horn was once considered incompatible with jazz until changing ideas of sound and musicians like John Graas quietly overturned that certainty.

By Jeffrey Agrell

Jazz and the Horn Series • Part 3

Jazz and the Horn

Getting started

For the classically trained horn player, jazz replaces the security of the printed page with listening, swing and improvisation—and a different kind of discipline.

By Jeffrey Agrell

Ornamentation of baroque music for brass

Baroque ornamentation forgotten? Without it, performances become dull and repetitive. This article argues for a return to style, freedom, and creative interpretation.

By Marc Meissner

Editorial

Is sound something you control—or something you become? Jean-Pierre Mathez challenges technique, fashion, and pedagogy: sonority is a lifelong conquest of freedom.

By Jean-Pierre Mathez

Part 6

The Trumpet in the USA

Diverse makers

As trumpet makers rethink their standard instruments, Monette, Malone and Blackburn bring leadpipe design into a new dialogue between players and workshops.

By Thomas Stevens

Part 2

The Haydn Trumpet Concerto

André, Wobisch, Dokshitzer, Stringer and others reveal how tempo, phrasing, ornamentation and cadenzas reshape Haydn's trumpet concerto.

By Alfred Willener

Tonguing

A tiny shift in tongue movement changes speed, endurance and clarity, turning articulation from a mechanical attack into one of the trumpet player’s subtlest tools.

By Louis Davidson

Yes or no? Beware!

Do we or do we not play transcriptions?

“Transcriptions: yes or no? Beware.” Roger Bobo challenges tubists to rethink repertoire, taste, and tradition in a bold call for musical judgment and artistic freedom.

By Roger Bobo

James Stamp, subtle teaching

Intonation, held notes and mouthpiece work shape James Stamp's subtle approach to trumpet playing, where listening and physical economy guide technique.

By Alfred Willener

The use of the mind in instrumental performance

Relaxation, concentration and mental imagery reshape technical practice, linking self-confidence and instrumental control beyond physical training alone.

By Michel Ricquier

Basics in breathing

An Outline to a Better Sound

From breathing awareness to sound production, practical exercises link physical relaxation, air control and rhythmic precision in everyday brass playing.

By Joel Elias

Phonetics in the articulation and expression of the language of music

Rethinking articulation: Francis Orval challenges traditional teaching—revealing how phonetics, language, and psychology shape sound, phrasing, and musical expression.

By Francis Orval

Natural trumpets, basic techniques

Natural trumpet playing demands more than historical equipment: Friedemann Immer sets modern technique against Baroque sound, articulation, style and authenticity.

By Friedemann Immer

ASA-Method, ASA-Technic

Virtuosity grows from disciplined work on scales, articulation and reading, arguing that consistent fundamentals matter more than chasing the upper register.

By Rolf Quinque

Indeterminate instrumentation

A Way of Extending Instrumental Technic

Can technique go beyond notation? James Fulkerson explores new instrumental possibilities and argues that improvisation is key to expanding both technique and musical thinking.

By James Fulkerson

Advices from an expert brass clinician: Robert Pichaureau, Paris

What if everything you control is wrong? This radical approach to brass playing shifts focus away from the embouchure — back to the true origin of breath and sound.

By Alfred Willener

Maurice Ravel and the new trombone

Dance-band trombonists reshaped orchestral expectations in the 1920s and 30s, leaving their mark on Ravel’s Boléro and a generation of players.

By Michel Laplace