Question

There are 10 less trumpets players then saxophone players. The number of saxophone players is 3 times the number of trumpet players. How many trumpet players are there?

Answer 1

Let the number of saxophone players be $s$.

Then, the number of trumpet players will be $s-10$

If saxophone players are three times the number of trumpet players then we have the relation

$s=3(s-10)$

This is a linear equation in s. we expand bracket to obtain,

$s=3s-30$

We group like terms to get,

$s-3s=-30$

$-2s=-30$

This implies that

$s=15$

The number of trumpet players are;

$15-10=5$

Therefore there are 5 trumpet players.