Does it matter what kind of metal your trombone is made out of? Silver,gold,brass,rose. How does it affect your tone and which is better for what type of music?

the color of the bell is determined by the diferent aloy that is used to make it. THere are huge diferences in the sound because a red bell has a diferent density than a silver bell. For most people silver gives them a bright tone.....most people...i seem to get a really dark tone with my 3b silversonic. play them all find the one you like.

I use a 1975 Conn 88H. It is by far the best trombone I have ever owned, or played. This was made the year before Conn started sending their trombones off to Mexico. It`s got a rose brass bell, which provides a really versatile tone. It is very dark usually, but it has the ability to be totally bright if need be.

I took a physics of music class at SJSU a few years back and here is what I learned. Contrary to popular belief, the type of metal used makes very little difference in tone, sometimes not even noticable depending on the player. Bell shape, the angle of bends, brace placement, and the player themself makes a much larger difference. This is strictly a physical explanation, in reality, there is a difference. Maybe it`s partly subconscious, if you expect there to be a difference there will be. In my experience, I have noticed a little bit of a difference swiching back and forth, but I`m not convinced that it was the horns themselves and not me thinking about it. Also remember, these differences are more between bras, red brass, gold brass, and the like. When you add silver, it does brighten up. (or it should...)

So for me, it makes such a small difference, that when choosing a horn, I look at many other things before metal composition. You can still get an extremely deep sound out of a brighter metal, and you can get a thin peircing bright tone out of a darker metal. I play a Bach Strad 16m for jazz, with the gold brass bell, and it isn`t much darker then the normal brass color. And, when I was testing Edwards equipment before I bought that, I tried all the same equipment, but switched just the bell from the brass to the rose brass. The difference that was there was noticable, but not enough for me to justify spending more or less for a certain bell color.

That said, I prefer the darker rose and red brass colors. They look pretty sick. And, if it makes more of a difference for you than me, there ya go. It really is all personal.

I like the look og th e copper un polished bells. I have only seen a couple but that is an awasome look.

Yeah deffinately, a friend of mine had the lacquer removed, and it looks awesome. Sounds great too.