Make a trombone sound like a trumpet in a DAW

[Mikebmiller]

So in my long (6 weeks) career in doing multitracks, I have had the occasional need to record a trumpet part on bone and then bump it up an octave. This works to some degree, as in the pitch is correct, but the sound gets very tinny. Is there some effect I could apply to the raised pitch track that would make it sound more like an actual trumpet?

Seb Skelly of youtube semi-fame has a video where he explains pitch shifting from a flugelhorn to a tuba.



It works, but to me it sounds very unnatural.

Any thoughts?

[harrisonreed]

EQ. It can get you close but since the original audio and articulations were on a trombone, EQ won't fix that.

[quiethorn]

You need something that can shift the formants in addition to the pitch. For a free VST, Graillon 2 can do this and is pretty good:
https://www.auburnsounds.com/products/Graillon.html

There's also Little AlterBoy, which costs a few bucks.
https://www.soundtoys.com/product/little-alterboy/

I do this in my own music frequently. Sometimes I do 2 octaves up. If you have a valved tenor instrument (baritone, euphonium, flugelbone, etc.), you'll get better results since no matter how good the pitch shift is, it'll still just sound like a slide trumpet unless your slide technique is so good that it's indistinguishable from valves.

[Mikebmiller]

Seb Skelley on Youtube is the master of this. He uses a flugelhorn to play tuba parts and a soprano bone for trombone parts. His videos sound great, but you can tell that those instruments are digitally altered.