TRUMPET vs. CORNET vs. FLUGELHORN! | Mahler Symphony No. 2, Movement 4

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Hey all! I hope you enjoyed this overview video of the trumpet, cornet, and flugelhorn. I know that it is unconventional to use anything other than a trumpet in an orchestral setting, but that's all the more reason I like to explore the hypothetical and demonstrate some contrasting tone qualities on a nice choral excerpt. Enjoy and make sure to leave a like for more!

[@KMHill]

Nice talk! You'll be a great teacher as well as player. Amazing to hear the different sonorities so clearly when played consecutively like this. I like them all for different reasons and am a little surprised to find I liked each one better a bit better than the previous one, so the flugelhorn is my fave sound as well. I love brass in Mahler's symphonies. He is my favourite composer.

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Thanks for your comment! I'm glad the differences could come through clearly as my Apple earbuds are not the best microphone in the world, and I'm glad you saw unique merits in each. And yes, Mahler probably takes the silver medal for me, second only to Bach, but in the modern orchestral scene he certainly has the best brass excerpts.

[@RGL01]

I agree. Flugelhorn for this piece of music.

[@smilefacewithcarrotnose4045]

Love the new intro dude!!

[@smilefacewithcarrotnose4045]

Also you are such a great speaker! You do well in music communication contexts. Keep up your good work please!

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

@@smilefacewithcarrotnose4045 Thanks so much! Will do :)

[@weaselskey1949]

This was super interesting, you can really hear how much darker the flugel was!

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

It's so much fun to play on! I spent a solid couple of years trying to get a flugel-like tone on my cornet, but having the right horn makes such a big difference in sound and enjoyment.

[@usetechkid]

Thanks for this great comparison video! I hope to see more soon!

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Thanks so much! Stay tuned!

[@rohandahiya7822]

For me, the trumpet sounds brighter and more pointed. The cornet sounds a bit darker but not by much and definitely more rounded. The flugelhorn sounds dark and rounded even a bit more than the cornet.

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Good observations! The main thing to realize, as you mentioned, is that the cornet isn’t much “darker” per se than the trumpet (especially not this very cylindrical example of a cornet), rather it’s softer and rounder sounding.

[@rohandahiya7822]

@@SamuelPlaysBrass what is the difference when you play the 3 different horns, especially for cornet which I don't play.

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

@@rohandahiya7822 well, the cornet plays a little easier than the other two because it’s compact and very receptive to the player, whereas trumpet tends to be a little more headstrong and flugel a little fussier and more temperamental. Lipping pitches gets especially tough on flugel.

[@johannab5295]

Rotary and pistonflugelhorn are quite much the same because the position of the valves are identically due to the conical bore which starts behind the valve block. That's what I learned from the youtube of a nice german instrument maker: Musikhaus Beck

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

That's very interesting! Of course, piston trumpets have much more tubing before the valve section than rotary trumpets, but I hadn't realized the two types of flugelhorns had the same amount. Thanks for the info! :)

[@GarySheehanMusic]

Clicked on this expecting the post horn excerpt that would work awesome on flugelhorn and cornet, but that was cool!

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Thanks Gary! You and the other guy, huh? We'll make it happen one day once I've had the patience to learn the whole excerpt!

[@GarySheehanMusic]

@@SamuelPlaysBrass the patience is the easy part on that one it's the endurance that is the real challenge!

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

@@GarySheehanMusic Too true!

[@adamh951]

All three instruments are useful for orchestral repertoire. The most obvious choice being C trumpet most of the time, but I have seen specific pieces call for cornet, sometimes even separate from the trumpet parts, like in Romeo and Juliet by Prokofiev. And pretty much any posthorn solo will work on flugelhorn.

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Lots of music in Berlioz's neck of the woods calls for both cornet and trumpet. Off the top of my head, Symphonie Fantastique is the best example. Then we played a piece in youth orchestra by Lalo called "Le Roi d'Ys" with the same two-trumpet, two-cornet setup. Also, the cornet is considered the closest descendent of the post-horn. Is my John Packer cornet a good replica of the post-horn sound? Not really. But old-style cornets are best equipped for it, especially since playing offstage makes the flugelhorn extremely woofy-sounding.

[@adamh951]

@@SamuelPlaysBrass I still prefer the sound of the flugel for the posthorn despite the lineage the cornet has to it. It’s nice and fat just like the post horn and the cornet to me is too trumpety

[@Matraka2000]

Great video. How is the quality of the doublers from ACB? I have heard they are great.

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Thanks Jose! The Doublers are indeed pretty exceptional for the price. The Doubler flugel is based on a Yamaha 6310 or 8310 (can't remember exactly) and they play almost as well!

[@prosperlost4046]

Hmm, I assumed you were going to do a comparison on the post horn solo from Mahler 3.

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

That's a really great idea for the future! Why hasn't it already been done? Well, learning the post-horn solo would be quite the ordeal for me. I know the first minute from memory, but if I were to make a comparison, I'd want to work up the whole part to a much higher standard, and to have the endurance and the ability to do that while approaching the three horns differently is an undertaking that will probably have to wait until I am an overall better player.

[@tiendrip-han6458]

Great Video :)

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Thank you!

[@paulscott4932]

Nice! The cornet gets my vote.

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Interesting choice! Are you much of a brass bander?

[@paulscott4932]

Not really. I just feel the character of the cornet sound fits Mahler's music.. Perhaps I'm hearing the rotary trumpet sound.

[@IvanWongYoutube]

Nice comparison!

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Glad you enjoyed!

[@bt8406]

Nice. For me, it looks like the beautiful sounding trumpet is peaking at 1k, where the coronet at 500k, and you can really see the flugelhorn full the space between 125-4k beautifully. Thanks!

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Wow, you performed a whole waveform analysis on these horns? That really is awesome! How do I go about doing something like that? I also think the conclusions are very accurate: the trumpet occupies a niche set of frequencies giving it a bright sound; the cornet is niche but peaks at lower frequencies, and the flugel has more of a presence overall.

[@NOLJAK101]

Great video same I love the demo of comparing the instruments that looks like 3 different trumpets as 9 players all together in one ensemble such as a concert band or brass choir! Pretty cool huh 3 B flat trumpets 3 corners & 3 fugal horns on one ensemble 1st 2nd & 3rd trumpets 3 trumpets get 1 separate part to even out the score! 2 or 3 first trumpets 3 2nd trumpet & 3 or 4 3rds! Witch make an even trumpet section to make the group sound great but anyways good video I love it I would love to see you do more videos like this with some of the others brass instruments someday in the future but i understand you have limits but anyways keep up the good work I love your videos man. 😊👍

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

Thanks man, if you're looking for a choir of three trumpets, cornets, and flugels, look no further: instagram.com/p/CEkOsfzAoZO/ This never got uploaded to YT but it's an arrangement of my former high school's fight song using all three!

[@glynburtt]

Wow dude, I love the way you’ve bought three identical instruments to get such a tight sound 😅

[@itznoxy7193]

For the Mahler excerpt the trumpet sounded the best. It has that noble tone which just makes that choral sound so heroic and somber. The other horns just didn't convey the emotion quite as authentically.

[@RobertCardwell]

The Masked Singer is on so I'll catch up later! 😷🎤👄👨‍🎤 Added: nice. You made me pull up that Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra recording of the Mahler 2 chorale because tuba.

[@SamuelPlaysBrass]

I'll have to wait until I'm working full-time as an engineer if I don't want to sell my internal organs, but one of these days I *will* get a tuba and catch up on all the tuba parts I've missed. :)

[@bun-bun5623]

Euph works fine for now, but yea. You'll want to have a tuba and it's going to work a lot better.

[@muellerreto8620]

The Flugelhorn has a very bad intonation, poor quality instrument.