Dictionary of Music - Birding America

evis 49brass instruments make up the still larger family ofthe wind instruments. The names of these twogroups are misleading, since some brass instrumentsare made of metals other than brass, andsome woodwinds, such as the flute and the saxophone,are nearly always made of metal. The maindifference between brass and woodwind instrumentslies in the way in which they are made tosound. In the brasses, it is the vibration of theplayer’s lips, pressed against the rim of the mouthpiece,that causes the air column inside the tube ofthe instrument to vibrate. (See also TONGUING.)When the lips are fairly slack the fundamental noteis sounded. As the lips are tightened more andmore, the successive notes of the harmonic series(overtones) are produced. In addition, the playermust produce more and more air pressure, supportedby the diaphragm and other muscles. To producenotes other than those of a single harmonicseries, the length of the air column must bechanged. In eighteenth- and early nineteenth-centurytrumpets and horns, this was accomplished bymeans of crooks (pieces of tubing added or takenaway between the mouthpiece and the main tube).Other early brass instruments, such as the cornett,used finger holes, as do most modern woodwinds.In present-day brass instruments, the length of theair column is changed either by finger-operatedvalves that open up extra sections of tubing permanentlyattached to the main body of the instrument,or by a movable slide (as in the trombone).The most important brass instruments of themodern orchestra are the French horn, trumpet,trombone, and tuba; the cornet and Wagner tuba arealso used occasionally. Modern marching bands alsomay use such instruments as the flugelhorn, baritonehorn, euphonium, various kinds of helicon (largebass tubas, among them the sousaphone), and varioussizes of saxhorn. In addition, there are manykinds of bugle, used mainly for military or signalingpurposes. The brass instruments of ancient timesinclude the Jewish shofar (still used), the Romanlituus, and the Scandinavian lur. Brass instrumentsused in Europe after the fifteenth century but nolonger used today (except for performing earlymusic) include the cornett, serpent, key bugle, andophicleide.brass quintetBratsche (brä′chə).See under QUINTET.The German word for VIOLA.bravura (brä voo — ′rä) Italian: “skill.” A termapplied to a musical passage or a style of performancethat requires considerable technical skillfrom the performer. Also see ARIA.brawlThe English name for BRANLE.break 1 In jazz and other popular music, a shortimprovised solo that displays the performer’s skill,much like a CADENZA. 2 A change in register (seeREGISTER, defs. 3 and 4), which both singers andinstrumentalists try to negotiate so that listeners arenot aware of it.breit (brīt) German: “broad.” A direction to performin a broad, measured manner.breve (brēv, brev). A note equivalent in timevalue to two whole notes (see BREVIS). —allabreve (äl′lä bre′ve) Italian. Also, cut time. A termused for the time signatures 2/2 and 4/2 (oftenmarked ), in which each half note receives onebeat. Originally, the term meant that the brevis wasto be the unit of time instead of the semibrevis, andthat the music was to be performed twice as fast,with only two beats per measure instead of four.Today, it means that the half note is the unit of timein place of the more commonly used quarter note.fig. 36 p/u from p. 53brevis (brā′vis, brev′is) Latin: “short.” The nameof a note value that was, in medieval music (thirteenthcentury), the shortest note value used. Later anumber of still smaller note values were introduced,such as the semibrevis and minima (literally, “halfbrevis”and “smallest”), and the brevis eventuallybecame the longest note value in use. Its modernequivalent, which is rarely used, is the double wholenote (with a value of two whole notes), indicated bythe sign .