UMaine Music Division to Debut New Rotary Trumpets
Contact: Jack Burt, (207) 581-1773, George Manlove, (207) 581-3756
ORONO — The UMaine School of Performing Arts’ Division of Music has acquired three new German rotary trumpets, which broadens the musical range of its brass collection for student and faculty concerts, according to Jack Burt, assistant professor of trumpet.
The three trumpets, purchased with a grant from the UMaine Scholarly Materials and Equipment Fund, will be used for research and performance by Burt and School of Performing Arts trumpet students.
Two of the new trumpets, in the keys of B flat and C, were made by Robert and Karl Schagerl of Mank, Austria specifically for the University of Maine. The trumpets are made predominantly to order by hand, according to Burt. The third is a piccolo trumpet in high A and B flat made by the Johann Scherzer company of Markneukirchen, Germany.
The piccolo rotary trumpet — a type heard in the musical accompaniment in Beatle’s song “Penny Lane” — is well-suited for 18th Century baroque scores, says Burt.
All three trumpets will be featured at three UMaine concerts at Minsky Recital Hall in April: a faculty recital featuring Burt at 2 p.m., April 3; on Brass Night at 7:30 p.m., April 4; and in a chamber music recital at 7:30 p.m., April 5, and additionally at a Brass Night concert at Bowdoin College, April 6.
Burt, who personally owns two German rotary trumpets — instruments with rotors like a French horn as opposed to pistons — says rotary trumpets can emit darker tones, but can become brighter as they get louder, and still maintain a mellower, less edgy tone. The traditional piston trumpet has a firmer, compact sound that can seem harsh by comparison.
“I wouldn’t want to say it’s a better or worse type of thing,” Burt notes. “It is one additional tool in the arsenal.”
Predominant in German-speaking countries today, rotary trumpets at one time were common in the United States from the start of the German immigration before the American Civil War until the First World War, according to Burt, a professional trumpet player and teacher, whose research includes studying period music composed specifically for trumpets, and writing about rotary trumpets in music journals.
As anti-German sentiment grew in the United States following the outbreak of WWI, the U.S. developed closer ties to France, which had developed the piston trumpet. The bond initiated a new emphasis on piston trumpets in this country, Burt says, and piston trumpets have since remained the standard instrument in the United States. German rotary trumpets, however, are now being rediscovered by American trumpeters and are seen with greater frequency in concert and recital halls throughout the country, he says.
Burt is a former associate professor of trumpet at Texas A&M University-Kingsville. He previously served as principal trumpet and soloist of the Corpus Christi Symphony and Victoria Symphony orchestras, has performed in Mexico City as principal trumpet for the Orquesta Filarmonica de la UNAM and was a member of the Orquesta Filarmonica de la Ciudad de Mexico. He joined the UMaine faculty last fall.