Eb trumpet vs Eb cornet- which is more versatile?

[Ep1cus]

Hello all
So I'm a uni student looking to buy a new horn and I'm wondering which is more versatile, Eb cornet or trumpet? I'm specifically looking under 1500 USD and it'll be the first eb horn i've owned. Some pros for the eb cornet would be a lower price around me and being able to use the same mouthpiece i'm going to use for a picc (planning on getting a brasspire from Trent Austin or a Getzen capri) at the cost of not being as appropriate for the Neruda, Hayden, etc.

Care to share your thoughts?
_________________
Antoine Courtois Evolution 1 Bb & C
Conn Vintage One Flugel
Besson be1000s

[Danbassin]

Find the best horn for you, for your available funds.

The Neruda is a horn concerto, and the Haydn was written for an instrument that few audience members would construe to be a trumpet. So, if your concern is playing music, don't worry about the horn - unless it keeps you from being able to express your music, in which case it's not the right horn for you!

Eb cornets and Eb trumpets are somewhat notorious for intonation problems, with the former being a bit more problematic than the latter. Lots of classical pros will break out their Eb trumpet to play challenging or delicate parts that may be extra challenging or too delicate for a big horn.

In much of Europe, playing the Haydn on a Bb trumpet is a litmus test and a regularly required audition piece, while in the USA most college students and pros perform this piece on the small, Eb trumpet.

Sorry not to give a direct answer with any of this, but the Haydn, Hummel, Neruda, and others will sound fine on a soprano cornet if you have the ability to realize your sound and your music on that horn. The Eb trumpet is a poor substitute for a soprano cornet in a British-style brass band, which isn't to say that a Schilke E3L (for example) hasn't been brought in in a pinch - I've seen that adequate yet questionable solution many times. In my opinion, playing this style of music is really the only advantage the soprano cornet would have over its trumpet cousin. Intonation will be a learning curve for both, with the likelihood that the Eb trumpet (if you're a trumpeter accustomed to smaller horns like a C and a picc) being less of a shock to the system than the cornet.

Hope this helps, happy searching!
-DB
_________________
Daniel Bassin
Conductor/Composer/Trumpeter/Improviser/Educator
I play:
Monette - CORNETTE/PranaXLT-STC Bb/MC-35/Raja A Piccolo;
Kromat C-Piccolo; Thein G-Piccolo; Various antique horns
MPCs - Monette Unity 1-7D and DM4LD

[TKSop]

As above - swings and roundabouts.

Both have definite strengths and weaknesses relative to each other... Both will work fine for most things in a pinch - neither are quite the jack of all trades.

If you're looking at relatively budget instruments, perhaps lean towards the trumpet - the very best sop cornets (Eclipse, Stomvi, Blackburn, Neo/Xeno, Schilke) are superb by any standards, though with significant differences between them(!)... but cheaper models and those of lesser renown are often a bear to live with, moreso than trumpet equivalents IMHO.

Either way you'll find quite steep learning curves with them

[cheiden]

In my limited experience, the Eb cornet is used almost exclusively for BBB. The Eb trumpet almost exclusively for classical literature and brass chamber music. Then again there's Malcolm McNab's use of a 4-valve Eb trumpet in place of his Bb whenever he has a mind to do so.

Unless you have some specific need I'd pool my funds and get a really good Bb/A picc first. I think that's the much more versatile instrument.
_________________
"I'm an engineer, which means I think I know a whole bunch of stuff I really don't."
Charles J Heiden/So Cal
Bach Strad 180ML43*/43 Bb/Yamaha 731 Flugel/Benge 1X C/Kanstul 920 Picc/Conn 80A Cornet
Bach 3C rim on 1.5C underpart

[Danbassin]

In reading over my initial response, I noticed a serious error, now corrected: Eb CORNETs are certainly more prone to poor intonation issues than most trumpets in the corresponding key.

Having done that edit, I thought I'd add two things, both of which I hope are helpful:

1) The Good, the BAD, and the Best -

As with most posts to this forum inquiring about equipment, I assume you're really interested in some specific recommendations about said equipment, beyond the contextualized generalizations I focused on in my response to your initial post. It should be noted that most players and most active members here tend to be a bit allergic to offering such specifics to someone they haven't met online for two good reasons, namely: a) no one unfamiliar with your playing can truly offer a good recommendation *FOR YOU* and also; b) there are many fine manufacturers, many inconsistent production runs, and a host of other player and brand biases that many wouldn't want to comment about too deeply 'on the record.'

So, while some further description of your currently playing, playing goals, current equipment, etc., would be helpful, we still don't know your playing, and we can only offer specifics rooted in our own subjective experiences with particular examples of instruments. However, it wouldn't be so tough to come up with a general list of Good, Great, OK, Avoidable...horns to help you narrow your search. Plus, it should generate some nice discussion:

SCHILKE E3-L
Like their P5-4 Piccolo, these horns are -or at least were- something of the industry standard. Therefore they're out of your price range. Available used examples do come up for Schilke E3-Ls, but they tend to show signs of significant use. Wynton recorded on them, as did so many others, and this design has been adapted/copied poorly, adequately, and exceedingly well by a number of manufacturers.
-Yamaha, Blackburn, Larson and others fall into this latter category, and therefore will rarely be found for a used price under that of a new Schilke - so we'll leave them out of this discussion. A fantastic-looking Jeninga is currently in the marketplace for ~$4K - well out of your price range - Paul Jeninga created bells and certain horn designs (including the E3-L) for Schilke. Therefore, we'll call this category "Boutique" Schilke-style Eb Trumpets.

SCHILKE's Eb Cornet is similarly a reference model, though I'm absolutely comfortable noting that the blow as well as the intonation of the Schilke Eb Cornet is not at the same level as the E3L or P5-4. As I've said before, Eb Cornets are quite a bit trickier than Eb Trumpets.

“MALONE-STYLE” Ebs
Separate from the tuning bell, long bell Ebs, another popular long-bell design involves a dramatic-looking 'S' shaped leadpipe, typically coupled with a fixed bell design. Bob Malone designed one of the most famous of these pipes, and others have their own takes on it - Zig Kanstul made several Ebs with this design, including under the Besson label. I had a Larson D trumpet with an S-shaped leadpipe, and actually a tunable bell, though Larson's flagship Eb/D is in the E3-L style tunable bell design. Please note that Bob Malone did not invent this design - I had a Mahillon Eb Cornet from 1905 with an S-shaped leadpipe.
-Examples of this design, such as the Kanstul-Besson can be found in your price range. Some of them play exceedingly well, but some may have wear and tear issues, and Kanstul is currently on a hiatus from brass production.
--Horns of both the E3-L and Malone design within your price range - and especially those $1,000 and under - must be played extensively before you decide whether or not to purchase. Thins can feel OK in the practice room and simply not work in 'real life' and vise-versa

BACH - examples A and B, when found, may fall within your price range.
Here I'll stick my neck out.
A) The first Eb trumpet I ever played was my teacher's old 'early Elkhart' Bach 304, the SMALL Eb. These horns are poor relics of a past era and style of playing (plus tolerance for missed notes/intonation inconsistencies that), some may play well, but I've never encountered them. To a certain extent, Bach Eb, F, and G trumpets are cut-down versions of the once-popular 211 bell, small bore D trumpets that Vacchiano certainly made sound like a million bucks. He's gone now, and perhaps Bach should have put more R&D into Eb and higher horns built from the ground-up. I frankly feel that part of the reason the F and G trumpets have cornet mouthpiece receivers stemmed simply from the fact that the horn was now even that much smaller than the D trumpet that served as its basis.
B) Bach 239 L and XL (.459, and .462 - note that with the higher horns, the bore nomenclature shifts) long bell, reversed leadpipe horns are something of a take it or leave it horn. I've played a number of them, and if you consider some of the intonation patterns of an off-the-shelf (not today's brand-new ones, nor tweaked, hand-picked ones of yesteryear) Bach Cs, this model is typically similar to worse. I haven't played one that didn't require long fingerings on D-Eb-E on both sides, third-space C, second-line G, and G above the staff similarly have their problems exacerbated.
-While you may find some good playing examples with either bore or bell configuration, many teachers and pros consider this model a bit too indelicate for the famous concerti you mentioned. I'm not so sure about that, but, with the intonation issues I've encountered on all the examples I've played, I wouldn't want to fight one of these through Haydn, even though certain orchestral, big horn, passages may lay well, and sound nice on the horn.
C) Lately, with Artisan and other developments, Bach gas gotten back into the high horn game with a vengeance. I'd like for others to weigh-in, but while the few examples I've tried ARE worlds apart from earlier Bach designs, I don't prefer them to either of the Schilke designs that preceded them (E3-L, or the more compact E3, fixed bell horn - which in all fairness the Bach Artisan small horn isn't exactly trying to copy).

OTHERS
Giant category that will have as many recommendations as there are people with opinions.
GETZEN's current offerings are great, gems can be found among their earlier Eterna models, but, in general the super-affordable 300 series should be avoided, tempting as they are.
SELMER was an industry leader before Schilke came around, I've played nice models in Radial and Sabarich, and even a later Selmer model in an E3-L design. Typically nice sound and challenging intonation. They also play 'smaller' than is now fashionable, but if you find one that you can sing through, pick it up - a past BBC Scottish Symphony principal whose name I don't recall can be seen using a Selmer Radial Eb in symphonies from Dvorak through Shostakovich, sounding big as a house.
D.E.G. made some nice Ebs with tunable bell that wasn't quite like the E3-L, but more closely resembled Schilke's earlier designs for tunable bell Cs: shortened front end, but still something that looked like a tuning slide crook, that was fixed in place. I've played two of these and they played GREAT, should've picked one up!
YAMAHA makes both the “Boutique” horns I mentioned above, played by Symphony Principals, and way out of your price range. That said, their ealier 700 and 600 horns are oftentimes the best budget choice – so long as you find one in good working condition. Further, I’ve found that these horns tend to be very personal. I once played a Schilke-style Yamaha that made me wish I had it rather than my Schilke when I did my run of Eb concerti. I’ve played some of their smaller 700 and 600 horns that I’ve liked, and quite a few that I couldn’t relate to.
-I'm intentionally leaving out so many, both to keep this post from becoming a Russian novel, and also because the range of other horns that you may encounter can really vary.

SOPRANO CORNET, in brief
As I mentioned above, Schilke made something of a reference instrument, but, in my opinion, they didn't hit as high a mark as with their smaller trumpets. Therefore, many other top end brands are also in favor - all out of your price range! Some surprisingly affordable examples by Yamaha, Getzen, and others may pop up, and some of them are generally very good. That said, many of the most affordable examples you'll encounter will suffer from some combination of stuffiness of blow, seemingly unmanageable intonation in, below, and above the staff, and so-on.
-An interesting compromise in Eb Cornet design should be noted regarding the Schilke horn: it uses the same exact tuning shank as the P5-4. I take this as something of a conceit that Ren & Co. figured out a really good way to get a cornet mouthpiece to play in the upper register with this next couple inches of tubing, and built the rest of their cornet around it. I had the great privilege last summer of being at the Monette shop during the last few weeks of their finalizing their first-ever prototype Eb Cornet. I don't think I'd be violating the trust of my friends there to say that to me it seemed that this was one of the most challenging prototype jobs they ever did - every single element, from the mouthpiece length, weight, shank diameter, etcetcetcetc. was poured over for over a year before my visit, and they were still working very hard on those last few miles of the journey: SOPRANO CORNETS ARE A CHALLENGE.



2) A word on Eb Trumpets –

I pointed out the detail of the Neruda “TRUMPET” Concerto actually being a horn concerto in my initial reply to this thread for a few reasons. Firstly, I wanted to dispel any worry you had about which horn you ‘need’ to have at this juncture. We all know that Wynton played the E3-L on his recordings, but we also know a that an E3-L won’t make us play like Wynton. Though, he clearly chose that horn for a reason, as did many others – after years on Selmers, Maurice André switched to Schilke, before moving on to Stomvi towards the end of his career…and eventually moving to a Scherzer for his piccolo work, likely due to arthritis and other hand problems (Gotta hand it to him for going almost an entire career playing horns by manufacturers whose names begin with “S” though!!). Beyond that, I do feel that its essential that we educate one another as a community. The trumpet, as we think of it today, is a relatively recent invention. We’ve gone about a hundred years with our horns essentially looking the way they do now, and just about fifty for small horns coming into their own – thanks in no small part to Schilke, and Mahillon before him. Our instrument quite literally has a history going back THOUSANDS of years, with the roots of much of our music dating to a period of several hundred years before the valve designs of the ~1820s.

Therefore, we should be curious and creative when approaching trumpet music of any given epoch. In classical music we can be quite specific: the keyed trumpet of Haydn’s concerto was built for a known individual, who tinkered with the design throughout his career; the corno da caccia was a popular instrument whose core repertoire is suitable for both high-horn experts and trumpeters; Buddy Bolden played the types of cornets available to him in New Orleans at the turn of the century, therefore Wynton Marsalis recorded his soundtrack to the upcoming biopic on some of those historical instruments. All of this said, we do live in the real world, which is more cookie-cutter than ideal, and audition committees, fellow trumpeters, teachers – to say nothing of our own pocketbooks – may discourage this or recommend that. I’ve remained noncommittal in my recommending you an Eb cornet over and Eb trumpet, as well as which brand to go after, as this is a decision FOR you and your musical path. Remember that most of our trumpets until the era of valves were almost twice as long as the ones we play – with fundamentals of low D, Eb, C, F…There were aspects of the brilliance of tone and attack on those lower instruments which some may want to bring to our interpretation of these historical works, while others prefer André’s Selmer picc sound, regardless of the fact that those baroque concerti were written for an instrument three times the size of that mid-century little horn he made sing.

Interested to see where this discussion goes, as well as where you end up on your journey.

Happy practicing, and all the best!

-DB
_________________
Daniel Bassin
Conductor/Composer/Trumpeter/Improviser/Educator
I play:
Monette - CORNETTE/PranaXLT-STC Bb/MC-35/Raja A Piccolo;
Kromat C-Piccolo; Thein G-Piccolo; Various antique horns
MPCs - Monette Unity 1-7D and DM4LD

[Jerry]

Do you primarily play British Brass Band, Symphony or Brass Quintet, or something else?

[Andy Del]

Uni student is quite a distinct term - maybe Australian? If so, (or British or NZ) then the OP may well have opportunity to play in brass bands.

From my perspective of having had to play a soprano a few times, and played a lot of Eb trumpet, and many different models is...

STOP. Do not make a purchase based on what you can avoid paying for. Get a job and save more $$$ to get a good horn YOU like. It can be an Eb cornet, although who knows why one would buy this instead of an Eb trumpet, unless you are playing it in a brass band and will do for a long, long time! Cheaper is not a viable option. Period.

Dan Basin make a lot of comments and they are generally spot on. I have a Kanstul S bend Eb/D which is actually a terrific horn, plays the pants off a Yamaha (those owners only grunt and sigh when they play the Kanstul). And a few other Eb instruments. My preferred axe is a 4 valve by Thein. Impeccable sound, fantastic intonation, and the ability to colour sound and make a musical statement is why I chose to play it when I have the need. The Kanstul is my go to horn on short notice (putting the Thein into Eb is a chore). So if you can find a Kanstul, go for it. I purchased mine via trumpet herald without trying it and it's a winner.

Last thought. If you are in OZ, there are a few Carol Brass Eb cornets floating about. I did play one which was a rather good instrument. It was in tune, had a good sound and wasn't a vague tubby pile of rubbish many sopranos are. Pity the tag price was wrong, or I would have bought it! Having warned you off Eb cornets, these seem OK. (As is the Schilke Eb cornet.)

cheers

Andy
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so many horns, so few good notes...

[Seymor B Fudd]

[zaferis]

I suggest you look for a D/Eb trumpet. Having both an Eb cornet and Eb/D trumpet in my collection, I can easily say I use the trumept more often, and pitch issues are less stressful on the trumpet. The Eb Cornet can be a squirrely cuss, so unless you buy a very nice one ($$$) you'll be in need of medication.

Many Eb trumpets are set up as combo horns - D/Eb making them even more versitile.
_________________
Freelance Performer/Educator
Adjunct Professor
Bach Trumpet Endorsing Artist
Retired Air Force Bandsman

[Christian K. Peters]

Hello all,
If you are talking versatile... Most trumpets are in the keys of D/Eb. Cornets not so much. I have tried to play my Schilke soprano with an A pipe, putting it into D, but it does not work so well. So, having a D/Eb trumpet would be better for the literature than an Eb cornet...UNLESS you are playing the soprano part in a brass band, then you need a cornet. What I know about trumpets and cornets are based on what I have owned. I have owned a Yamaha and Schilke soprano cornet and I have owned fixed bell Yamaha and a Bach EL D/Eb. I have also spent some time with a friends E3L. The E3L was by far, the superior instrument. Those with unlimited funds, will always choose a boutique Eb cornet over a Schilke, but the Schilke played circles around the Yamaha I owned. If you are patient, wait or a good used Schilke to come around, whether it be a soprano or an E3L. You get what you pay for when you talk small horns.
_________________
Christian K. Peters
Schilke Loyalist since 1976

[Liberty Lips]

Dan, and Andy,

As you are referring to the Kanstul Eb/D trumpets, do you mean the 923 long bell Eb? I find that to be a particularly sweet horn.

[Don Herman rev2]

Based on long-ago trials:

D/Eb trumpets in the order I preferred them:

Blackburn
Kanstul 1523, Schilke E3L
Kanstul 923, Yamaha (forgot model)
Bach (forgot model)

The Blackburn was just incredible. I found the Kanstul Signature and Schilke different but very strong in their own ways. The extra chamber bell is a nice option with the Kanstul. The Custom Kanstul and Yamaha were also very good but to me a tic below the top tier models. The Bach wasn't in the running; I thought it must have been defective or at least needing Flip's enhancement process (or Osmun or whomever -- it was stuffy, valves felt bad, and was much more out of tune than the rest).

I have only tried an Eb soprano once or twice and recall virtually nothing about them. Seemed fun, but not being in a brass band couldn't justify it by a long shot. I don't use my D/Eb all that much now (Christmas and Easter ) but used it fairly often in the orchestra.

FWIWFM - Don
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"After silence, that which best expresses the inexpressible, is music" - Aldous Huxley

[ertatta]

Buy used and a B&S challenger tunable bell horn should be found with a little patience for around your budget. they are excellent horns and in some ways i prefer over the equivalent Schilke and Yamaha. a used Kanstul or Stomvi could also be another excellent used value.