The Cornett has a straight or slightly curved wooden tube, with the fingerholes of a woodwind instrument. The only feature that the cornett shares with the modern cornet is the cup-shaped mouthpiece, common to all brass instruments. The cornett is wonderfully expressive : its sound is distinctively sweet, but with the flexibility of the human voice.
Family |
Brasses |
Pitch range |
Approximately two-and-a-half octaves. |
Material |
Pear, plum, maple, or walnut, sometimes covered in leather, with a mouthpiece of horn, ivory, or wood. |
Size |
Variable, but the standard treble cornett is about 24 in (60 cm) long. |
Origins |
The cornett derived from an animal horn with fingerholes pierced in the side. The wooden cornetts that they inspired were popular throughout Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries. |
Classification |
Aerophone: an instrument that produces its sound by the vibration of a column of air. |
And also... |
A straight kind of cornett exists called a mute cornett. |