David is subject to the law of Moses, which gives trumpets to priests and bells to the high priest. In that respect, nothing changes for the four hundred years after Moses. Then God makes David king. Suddenly, under David’s leadership, the flourish of the trumpet swells into the stirring grandeur of a full orchestra!
We first notice the change in 2 Samuel 6. The ark, God’s special container that holds the Ten Commandments, must be moved to Jerusalem. For the occasion, King David organizes one of Israel’s grandest parades ever!
And David and all Israel were celebrating before God with all their might, with song and lyres and harps and tambourines and cymbals and trumpets. (1 Chronicles 13:8 cf. 2 Samuel 6:5)
Sadly, this first parade falls apart with a terrible tragedy. (We’ll see why later.) But the second is better organized.
David also commanded the chiefs of the Levites to appoint their brothers as the singers who should play loudly on musical instruments, on harps and lyres and cymbals, to raise sounds of joy…. Chenaniah, leader of the Levites in music, should direct the music, for he understood it…. Shebaniah, Joshaphat, Nethanel, Amasai, Zechariah, Benaiah, and Eliezer, the priests, should blow the trumpets before the ark of God…. So all Israel brought up the ark of the covenant of the LORD with shouting, to the sound of the horn, trumpets, and cymbals, and made loud music on harps and lyres. (1 Chronicles 15:16, 22, 24, 28)