TrumpetBoy

I’m just back in from playing a Rat Pack show in Darlington this evening. It’s really been a pleasure to get back and play with one of the British bands. The last two weeks have been an eye-opener in terms of the cultural differences between UK and US musicians; it seems, in short, that as [...]

It’s been a couple of unlucky days. We flew over to Hamburg with the Rat Pack Tour yesterday and, in a bid for a quiet life, I packed my small trumpet case in my suitcase.

This is the Ophicleide; a weird, old Brass instrument that we encountered today at Musik Bertram in Freiburg, Germany. I had never heard of this instrument but was enlightened by the accompanying poem:
The Ophicleide, like mortal sin
Was fostered by the serpent.
It’s pitch was vague, it’s tone was dim,
It’s timbre, rude and burpant.
Composers, in a secret [...]