#Selmer trumpet history professional
#Selmer trumpet history series

Conn's factory produced an estimated 10 percent of all goods made in Elkhart, and by the late 1880s the business employed as many as 300 workers, many of them skilled laborers brought in from France and England. However, the town persuaded him to stay, and the company rebuilt in Elkhart. The factory burned down in 1883, and Conn considered moving his business to Ohio. He was elected mayor of Elkhart in 1880 at the age of 36. By 1878, the company had a large factory, and Conn had become a major employer in Elkhart. continued to grow, making all kinds of wind instruments as well as mouthpieces. Dupont left the company after three years, but the C.G. The two began working on improved brass instruments, hoping to create a 'perfect' cornet. In 1876, Conn invited a French musical instrument maker, Eugene Victor Jean Baptiste Dupont, to join him in Elkhart. He took out several patents for his mouthpieces in the United States as well as in Canada, England, France, and Belgium. Conn went into business making and selling a variety of musical instrument mouthpieces, working first out of a small second-story space over a drugstore and later opening his own brass foundry. Possibly in collaboration with his former boss at the Buchanan horse collar pad factory, Conn found a way to vulcanize rubber directly onto metal, and in 1874 he produced his first rubber-rimmed trumpet mouthpiece. Shortly thereafter, Conn and his wife moved to Elkhart, Indiana, where Conn pursued various lines of work that included peddling a healthful ointment, engraving silverware, making rubber stamps, and inventing and selling sewing machine parts. Apparently the pain of playing his cornet with a swollen, tender lip gave Conn the idea for a rubber-rimmed mouthpiece. While playing in a traveling band, he got in a fight and received another career-changing blow, this one to the lip. So he switched to cornet, which had been his secondary instrument, and quickly became a very good player. He was the Buchanan town band leader, and the injury made it impossible for him to play his violin. Conn allegedly broke a finger while at work at the local horse collar pad factory.

#Selmer trumpet history series

A series of accidents led to his invention of an improved trumpet mouthpiece. Conn was born in 1844, and as a young man lived in Buchanan, Michigan. Conn Company was founded by Charles Gerard Conn, a skilled musician, band leader, inventor, entrepreneur, and politician. After the acquisition, the parent combined the two subsidiaries to create Conn-Selmer, Inc.ДЇrom Horse Collar Pads to Vulcanized Mouthpieces In 2000, Selmer's parent company, Steinway Musical Instruments, bought United Musical Instruments, formerly known as C.G. Both went through a series of ownership changes and made acquisitions of smaller companies. Conn and Selmer were both leading wind instrument manufacturers based in Elkhart, Indiana, since the early years of the 20th century.

#Selmer trumpet history professional

Many of these are historic brands with a cherished reputation among both professional and amateur musicians. Conn and Selmer brasswinds, Artley flutes, King band instruments, Bach trumpets, and instruments made under the names Emerson, Glaesel, Scherl & Roth, Musser, and Wm. The company makes and distributes many prominent brands of musical instruments, including C.G. is the largest manufacturer of wind instruments in the United States.