It might be hard to add valves to a wooden instruments though, of course, not all woodwind instruments are made of wood. It has always been a puzzle to me that the holes in the tube technique produces a poor effect with brass instruments but satisfactory with woodwind instruments. You might be interested to read up on the Hornbostel-Sachs classification system for musical instruments.
Specifically, under this system, wind instruments are categorized as follows:. The player's breath is directed against a lamella or pair of lamellae which periodically interrupt the airflow and cause the air to be set in motion. Flutes are in category ; "woodwinds" other than flutes are in category All "brass" instruments are in category Within each of these subcategories, there are many, many, many sub-subcategories.
Within category , there are subcategories for double reeds This system therefore categorizes bassoons and clarinets as more closely related to each other than to flutes. Concerning the use of keys on brass instruments: category Within this category, we have. In addition to the "keyed trumpet" mentioned in the OP, the ophiclede , cornett , serpent , and Vladimir horn are all keyed trumpets under this system.
In some sense, all of these could be considered "brass instruments" even though the last three are typically made mostly of wood. Musical instruments are classified by the way the sound is produced. The material is immaterial and brass and woodwind instruments can both be made from metal, plastic or wood. Woodwind instruments are those where you blow across an opening flute , or use a single reed sax, clarinet , or double reed oboe, bassoon. I think pipe organs are in this class too.
Brass instruments are those where you use your lips to create the vibration, like blowing a raspberry. Percussion is where you make the sound by hitting something with something else: snare drum, piano striking strings with hammers.
I play saxophone a woodwind instrument made from brass and didgeridoo a brass instrument made from wood. I've offered the didge to some brass ensembles but this never seems to get taken up for some reason.
The "puckered lips" which produce the note in a brass instrument create a sound pressure wave which is very nearly a square wave. Unfortunately, when this is done to a standing square-wave, following Fourier decomposition analysis the waveform gets badly distorted because some of the sine frequencies which make up the square wave are completely destroyed but others aren't. Any type of source waveform is "happy" to operate in this situation - consider a slide whistle, for example.
Sign up to join this community. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top. Stack Overflow for Teams — Collaborate and share knowledge with a private group. Create a free Team What is Teams? Learn more. Woodwind v brass instruments - what is the defining characteristic? Ask Question. Asked 3 years, 4 months ago. Active 3 years, 4 months ago. Viewed 9k times. So, what is the defining characteristic?
Some, like the trombone, instead use a slide. Slides operate by a similar principle as valves. The musician simply adjusts the position of the slide to lengthen or shorten the amount of tubing that the air goes through before it reaches the bell.
As is the case with all brass instruments, the air still reaches the bell before the sound is released, as opposed to woodwind instruments where the point that the air is released is altered through the use of keys.
The key takeaway is that a woodwind instrument will have multiple areas where the sound can escape the instrument, whereas a brass instrument will only have one. Once again, this criteria demonstrates that flutes fall into the category of woodwind instruments. Flutes have keys which open or close holes, allowing the air to escape the instrument without going through its full length.
Typically, the sound of a brass instrument is pointed in one specific direction, while the sound of a woodwind instrument goes in every direction.
This makes intuitive sense; since all the sound of a brass instrument is released at the bell, all the sound travels in the same general direction. In the case of woodwind instruments, the keys allow sound to escape at various points of the instrument. The sound travels in no particular direction because it is going in every direction. Again, we can see that the flute fits in with other woodwind instruments, rather than brass. Since the flute has keys like every other woodwind instrument, the sound often escapes well before it reaches the bell, and goes in no particular direction.
The material that an instrument is made out of has nothing to do with the way that it is classified. Woodwind instruments can be made out of metal, plastic, wood, or other materials. Brass instruments, while commonly made of brass, can also be made out of plastic. Clarinets and flutes were originally made out of wood, and even the first models of the saxophone were constructed from wood. However, as instrument makers gained access to manufacturing and plastic, many of them began to experiment making instruments in their traditional designs but with other materials.
The sheer diversity of materials that can be used in the production of instruments effectively makes the use of a material-based criteria obsolete. Even with different materials, the designs of the instruments and the need to classify them into separate categories , remains the same.
In general, all the criteria which make an instrument woodwind tend to go together. There is no instrument, for instance, which produces sound the way that a woodwind instrument does, but changes pitch the way that a brass instrument does. Woodwinds are usually made from wood, as the name suggests, but there are some made from metal.
Flutes, for example, used to be made from wood until about Since they have largely been made from nickel with silver-plate or even solid silver. With the advent of new materials, you will find woodwind instruments made from other materials. These might be Resin, Plastics, or a Hybrid of both. The wood used on instruments needs to be very dense to allow milling and screw threads.
They also need to be moisture resistant to avoid warping. However, the more expensive instruments are still made from wood for a very good reason. They have a tonal quality that other materials cannot replicate. The other major difference between brass and woodwind is the playing technique. Most woodwind instruments use a reed to create the sound.
This is used to create the mouthpiece. It sits at the back of the mouthpiece, and as you blow and pass air through it, the reed vibrates, creating the sound. The reed is usually made from Cane and is quite thin and vulnerable. It needs to be changed quite often. Sometimes due to the collection of moisture. This creates a different sound.
You may wonder if they should be termed as woodwind, but there are many other similarities. These instruments are the Flute and all its varieties, and the Piccolo. Sound is created by driving the air across a hole. When the angle and the amount of air pressure are correct, the air vibrates against the hole on the far side of your mouth. Originally these instruments were made from wood, tusks, animal horns, and a variety of other materials that were available at any given time.
These days Brass is the predominant material, although there are varieties. There is Yellow Brass which is the most common. Much of the mechanics, valves, etc. This is one of the major differences, of course.
Both sets of instruments use the force of air to create the sound. But the Brass instruments do not use a reed in the mouthpiece. Brass instruments have no parts that are moving that create the sound. Pitch is changed by a combination of changes in airflow. That is changing the length of the tubes that the air is flowing through.
Pitch adjustments are also made through the lip tension of the player. There are certain challenges when playing Brass and Woodwind instruments.
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