"Mutes and Other Distortionary Audio Lenses" by Steve Provizer

My last post showed some of ways mutes have been used in jazz trumpet playing.  The technological extension of the sound alteration/manipulation done by mutes is, of course, electronics. Or, before that-mechanics. The photo below shows the mechanical trumpeter constructed by Friedrich Kaufman in 1810. Obviously, after a very tough gig.

T. Blanchard w. wireless mic

Note that I'm not talking about simply updating the means of amplification by having a wireless mic attached to the bell of the horn; that simply allows the player to move away from a stationary mic and still be heard. 


You do need to run through a mic so that the sound becomes an electronic signal. Then, you can run it through an effects box. Initially that process involved re-shaping an analog wave, but for the last couple of decades, like everything else, this has moved into the digital domain; domain being the appropriate word for the hegemony of this technology.