Wild Thing Trumpets

Wild Thing Trumpets

Posted on April 11, 2015 by Clint McLauglin

Here is a short review of The Wild Thing Trumpet.

“Damn !!!”

It plays so much better than any other make I’ve ever played that I now consider those horns to be HS level horns.

Here is why. The bell is different at the throat and it has almost NO bell flare. A long conical tapered bell. That design element shifts the nodal points toward the mouthpiece and enables the horn to SLOT higher notes than any other trumpet made. (Including $ 20,000 Monettes.) Some horns stop slotting notes around high A others go to Bb , B and a very few make it to double c. This horn SLOTS double E.

Slotting notes is as important in the upper register as it is in the lower register. We can all BEND pitches and play them with the wrong fingerings. They don’t have the same tone quality, projection, power, response…. as they do if we finger it the right way. Play a low D 1-3 then play it open. It is not slotted that way.

As the sound wave goes through the trumpet it goes to a certain point in the bell, bounces off of the soft boundary (air) and travels back through the horn. The higher the pitch is the farther it goes down the bell before it returns. In most trumpets it stops returning in the A, Bb, B above high C range. Where it stops depends on the bell flare. A couple of years ago Jerry Callet started making horns with shorter leadpipes (1/2″ on each side of the tuning slide). He added that 1″ to the bell flare to help shift the reflection point toward the small end of the conical shape (mouthpiece end). He was making a horn to slot a double C.

Flip changed the entire bell taper on the Wild Thing to such an extent that the reflection point shifts so that E over double high C can slot. That means that those can now have the sound quality of REAL NOTES and not merely squeels. That is a BIG DEAL for lead players.

I played some low, fast, old jazz tunes and was impressed with the quick clean response from low F3 to low C. Some horns are a little stuffy here. The WT sings in the lower register. The horn plays very mellow but when air is added it can clearly cut through the band. That makes it great for jazz chair or lead.

I played some Clarke pieces on it to check the flexibility. I was able to play 40 beats a minute faster than I could on a Callet, Calicchio or Benge. I mean clearly with clean, crisp attacks and slotted fleshed out notes

I talked about the quick response of the Wild Thing compared to a Callet Jazz. That is because up to that point the Jazz had the fastest response of any horn I’ve played. The Wild Thing is quick I still have not out played it. I didn’t compare it to a Bach. But lets get real here. People buy Bachs and spend 1600 – 2000 dollars to make them play like pro-level horns. The conversion of Bach trumpets is a FULL TIME business for 2 different companies and part time for too many to count. Those are NO Longer Bachs. You could take a $50 toy trumpet and make it play well if you spent 2000 on it.

I played the Haydn and Hummel concertos on it. After changing to the #2 slide (included with every horn) I was able to play those with a full dark sound and a light bassoon like touch on the triplet arpeggios. The WT is the ONLY horn I’ve played that I couldn’t out perform. In a word my description is “Damn !!!”

You owe it to yourself to try one of these  Wild Thing Trumpets.

I don’t put my endorsement out often. When I do I mean it.

If you are in the Dallas / Ft. Worth / Denton area come over and try out mine.

Pops