The BRASS family

 The brass family is comprised of powerful metallic instruments that must be blown into by theplayer to make a musical sound.The tone-color (timbre) of most brass instruments can be altered by the use of various types of mutes which are inserted into the large end of theinstrument. Until the invention of the VALVE, brass instruments could only produce a limited number of pitches, which lessened their usefulness to composers. Instrument builders experimented with various VALVES that would avail more pitch varieties to these instruments. Many modern brass instruments have a system of 3 VALVES that can be depressed in variouscombinations to produce different pitches. The modern "rotary" valve was invented in the early Romantic period (c. 1830)—an invention that made the brass family more responsive and reliable. As a result, Romantic composers made greater use of the brass family.

The most common types of brass instruments include

:• various-sized trumpets (use valves to change pitch)  

• various-sized trombones (use a slide instead of valves to change pitch) 

 • the "French Horn" (use valves to change pitch)  

• the Tuba—a very low brass instrument (uses valves to change pitch)

The standard range categorization of this family is as follows

:• Trumpet (soprano),Alto Trombone (alto),Tenor Trombone and upper French Horn(tenor), Bass Trombone and low French Horn (bass)