Beginner Question: Why are built in keys other than concert key?

[Jonathan Fulkerson]

It's not a silly question at all. I think the majority of the answer to the
question has to do with the length of the instrument. The length of any
instrument has a lot to do with what pitch and octave in general it will
play. For instance, a Tenor Saxophone and alto saxophone actually sound in
different octaves. It would require a completely different set of
fingerings to be able to play all the saxophones or all the instruments in
general on the same pitch.

It's extremely confusing I know, but the safest way to answer the questions
is just to say that it would mean that every saxophone Soprano, Alto, Tenor,
Bari, etc. would have a completely different set of fingerings. And perhaps
the sequence as to where the fingerings lay would be very impractical.
Instead, they just took the fingerings and made them the same for all the
different saxophones (and other inst.) and put them into different
transposing pitches.

I certainly am not smart enough to have figured it out. In fact, if anyone
has a better way to answer the question or wishes to ellaborate, please feel
free to speak up.

Sincerely,

Jon Fulkerson
Fulkerson Single Reed Studio

Just a silly question, but I have alway's wonder why aren't all
instruments designed in the same key. Is there an advantage in having
a Bb trumpet, Tenor Sax, or Eb Alto. Why are there transposing
instruments ?

[DON KENNEDY]

hi guys..........i don't think this answers the question...........the truth
is.........the guys that developed these instruments screwed up.......and no
one since has had the balls to straighten it out............we've got
computers now.........run everything ever written through some programs and
rewrite it............if an instrument makes a sound that sounds like
concert C..........call it a C...........anything else is
nonsense.......................d[]\/[]k

Jonathan Fulkerson <ful...@grnco.net> wrote in message
news:3c25...@george.grnco.net...

[BobMac]

As far as I can figure: Brass instrumenst used to be
adjusted by crooks, and would only play the harmonic series
in one key. When they acquired valves, they, for some
reason, stabilized in the keys of Bflat and F. (No idea why,
open to suggestions.)

The original play of A. Saxe was to build in the keys of
Bflat and Eflat for military (mostly brass) bands, and in C
and F for orchestras. The saxophone receving a less than
torrid welcome in the orchestral world, there just wasn't
much demand for the C and F horns, so there wasn't much
production.

rm

[G]

And yet we still have QWERTY keyboards, VHS videos, Microsoft software, and
7/5 keyboards as common place standards... it is no surprise that Boheme
fingering remains in place ... its the populous mass attitudes and a drive
to stick to known standards (that results either from good marketing or by
default because it "what was first") that keeps "what could be bettered"
where it is.

Jim Schmidt has an interesting solution for Sax fingering - has anyone got
one of his instruments?

G

DON KENNEDY <d...@cmc.net> wrote in message
news:72befcc70506587b...@spamfreenews.com...