Music: The Inflated Trumpeter

As every trumpeter well knows, to sustain a note of clarity, volume and high pitch through 53 inches of drawn-brass tubing requires the lung power of a bull moose and the finesse of a brindled gnu. What few trumpeters know is that while tootling they approximate the effects of "a formidable Valsalva maneuver," i.e., a hard nose-blow with nostrils and mouth blocked. To find out just how formidable the effects are, London's Dr. E. P. Sharpey-Schafer and California Musician Maurice Faulkner last summer sat down in London. Faulkner huffed his way through several trumpet passages, including a phrase from Wolfram's Song to the Evening Star in Act III of Tannhäuser. In reporting their findings in the British Medical Journal, the researchers noted that:

¶ It seems to require greater pressure to play the trumpet than any other commonly used instrument.

¶ Playing high loud notes for more than a few seconds on the trumpet may cause dizziness or blackout.

¶ A trumpeter is safer sitting than standing, and safest of all when he is lying flat on his back.

¶ "Wagner is the composer with least consideration for the feelings of the trumpet player."

Any orchestra worth its salt, say the authors, protects the first trumpet by hiring an assistant "to take over in prolonged difficult passages." But for the budget-ridden orchestra they have another, possibly facetious, suggestion: "It might be possible to dispense with the assistant if the trumpeter wore a pilot's pressure suit, which could be surreptitiously inflated by a switch on the conductor's desk."