A chance to exchange notes on the little everyday things that cheer you up when you're down, or make an ordinary day into a better one. Winning move unaltered.
(Pablo) The quality of the metal probably reflects the overall quality of the design from an engineering point of view but should not affect the actual tone since all the sound comes out of the bell and the material of the instrument itself hardly vibrates at all. This obviously does not apply to an instrument with a sounding board such as a piano, violin or guitar but it certainly does to a brass instrument. You can make a "brass" instrument out of anything, even cardboard. A metal mouthpiece probably helps though. The worst thing about a cheap 'n' nasty trombone, say, is a sticky slide or leaky water valve, engineering defects. If you open the water valve some notes just disappear; they just cannot be played whereas others are completely unaffected. Weird! All to do with nodes and antinodes.
Watching the little birdies scoffing their mealworms. It seems mealworms are the best thing ever, to a bird. I am less enthused over the featherless cat that also likes them.
[Rosie] Granted that brass instruments are at base, merely tubes (so the didgeridoo qualifies as a brass instrument(??)), I think you could find many top pro brass players who say the metal matters very much. Not just for reasons of weight and balance, but the sound that they can get on them. Re the water valve, I once knew a trombonist who could play a scale on it. You had to be there.
(Pablo) They get a good sound because they feel comfortable with the instrument which is probably expensive, shiny, well put together, well balanced and has a nice easy slide. The material simply can't matter because it doesn't vibrate. As for the didgeridoo, I'd say yes, it's fundamentally a "brass" instrument because the sound is formed by the player's lips, not by a reed. So, for the same reason, is the sodding vuvuzela. I've played one made out of rubber. It blows just below the Bb below middle C. Harmonics are difficult to get and ridiculously out of tune anyway. BTW I'm not "top brass" let alone a top brass player. Big Band hack, more like.