Tuba Intonation - Rant

[martyneilan]

Why is it that the majority of tubas made (and still being made) have intonation that would be considered unacceptable on nearly any other instrument? I'm not talking about the geometric vs. arithmetic progression that comes from combining valves (ie 123 being sharp when 1, 2 and 3 are individually in tune). I mean just being able to play a Western music scale nearly perfectly in tune from the bottom to the top using the appropriate fingerings without any lipping, slide adjustement, or alternate fingerings.

Mega dollar (or mega Euro) instruments have all sorts of slide stops, pulls, strings, and/or triggers. Outside of descending into the near-pedal range when many valves are used in odd combinations, why can't they make horns that play in tune top to bottom?

Even tubas with supposedly "good" intonation require adjustments that would be unheard of on an intermediate level trumpet.

[gocsick]

I don't know... my buddy talks about how great the intonation on his $$$$ custom trumpet is and he is still constantly manipulating slides via a 3rd slide ring and 1st slide trigger.

I don't think tubas are comparatively worse. I mean have you ever heard a really in tune Flugelhorn?

[jtm]

Seems like it must be a fundamentally hard problem.

On the other hand, my pair of forty year old East German tubas come pretty close to being right on.

[the elephant]

Money.

R&D of that nature costs a lot of money. There are not enough of us paying the $$,$$$.$$ needed to support it in any meaningful way. Too few customers are willing to pay for that through increased prices.

The smallest brass community needs access to the most expensive instruments.

Add to that the fact that many tuba players are not affluent to begin with, and you see where this is going.

For years I have stated that the very best tubas out there are "okay" but that most tubas sport acoustics similar in quality to a mediocre beginner trumpet. They are screwy in tuning, response, tone, and everything else outside of a one-octave range. If you want a tuba with the bugs worked out you have to pay the makers enough scratch to do the research and prototyping work to dig out all that dirt.

The crowd at their factory doors waving wads of cash just doesn't exist.

We need good instruments. But to the makers, until more of us buy them and more of us are willing to subsidize the needed research we do not deserve these great leaps forward. I do not agree with this, but it has been my observation that this is the attitude.

Give me enough money and I'll do the work to fix the mess that I created for you in the first place, or you can take the mess I have created as it is and STFU.

I do not like this but fully understand it. They have a lot of families to support and they like to go home at the end of the day like us. We want them to embark on years of re-design work and to offer only horns in the future with all bugs worked out.

Ain't gonna happen until everyone has cloned themselves about 25 times to increase the size of our customer demographic, and all of us collectively decide that the price of the YamaYork is the new normal.

[bloke]

The best trumpet player I know had me install a main tuning slide trigger on his previous super-expensive custom trumpet (a make known for particularly good intonation) and he had the manufacturer (or someone else?) install one on his current super-expensive custom trumpet. I think he might disagree with you about how well orchestral instruments - other than tubas - play in tune... and I'm not trying to argue with you. I'm just letting you know that others who play some of those other instruments might not agree with you.
I think because of the scale of our instruments (and by "scale" I mean size), the things that only require a quarter inch to an inch of adjustment on other brass instruments are obviously going to end up requiring two inches of adjustment on ours to solve an equally serious problem, and - of course - by a quarter inch or a half inch, I actually mean a half inch or an inch, and by two inches I actually mean four inches.

The same trumpet player to whom I refer is a really good teacher, but he's not orthodox. When students have trouble with accuracy and fluffing notes and such, he points out to them that the reason they are missing attacks is because they are trying to play those pitches in tune, and their instruments are not in tune. I'm thinking he encourages them to attack pitches where their instruments want to play them and then instantly pull them to pitch, rather than attempting to attack them at pitch.

All of that having been said, I'll gladly agree with you that an inordinate percentage of tubas feature wretched intonation compared to other instruments. I used to buy some of those tuba-shaped things, but I think you probably have noticed that I'm through with any of those. Those instruments that offer a "world clsss sound" and have no scale... so what about the supposedly amazing sound, if those devices are unable to speak the language of Western music, which is intonation?

You know how long I waited to purchase the particular model of extra large tuba that are currently own and what I was willing to sacrifice in order to be able to play it: a whole bunch of time to relearn a whole bunch of things - time spent not too far from the end of my life, but it's so much easier to play in tune than so many other things, even though it's probably a little bigger than most of the things in its size range and the bore size is bigger than the overwhelming majority of the things in its size range, plus I'm having to keep rotary valves and their linkage all working perfectly, because it's so easy for that stuff - if neglected - to end up being slow, etc etc. It's the tuning characteristics that irresistibly drew me to it, and the fact that the type of resonance it offers is superior to just about everything in its size range is a nice little bonus, but the tuning characteristics were the leading thing on its plus side, as well as my leading requirement for an instrument.

Addendum: I also believe the absurdly widely expanding bugle our instruments feature can wreak havoc with intonation, but without that the characteristic, the characteristic sound wouldn't be there.

[Charlie C Chowder]

Try playing a saxophone!

CCC

[tofu]

.

[MikeMason]

My understanding is that the physics just isn’t there for a brass instrument to play in tune(which is an ever moving target- key of music, other musicians,weather,etc). Best you can do is find one with reasonable solutions. My f has a simple main tuning slide stick and a long main slide. I spent 3 months memorizing where the stick goes for every single note but now it’s done. My b flat is pretty close with a few alternate fingering and some lipping. Yes, the level of intonation perfection in your ensembles plays a critical role in how well the solutions work. I’m not sure why there’s such a stigma with main slide gadgets, but that seems to be the most logical solution,but the slide has to be long enough and the horn needs to be significantly sharp with main slide all the way in.

[bloke]

When brass instruments are played louder, the pitch goes up - unless a player does something about it. Yeah I'm talking about everything from trumpets to tubas...

...and the same thing happens as an instrument is warmed up by a player's breath and being held next to a players body.

The point I'm making is the asking of the question, "What is the definition of an instrument that plays in tune?"

... and the question is pretty nuts and bolts, not in the least esoteric...

... look at golf clubs:
Some of them are thought to be mediocre, okay, good, or great. Probably most all of them can be used to whack a golf ball away from the player.
People talk about golf swings and break them and down into twenty parts, and then - when someone tries to execute those twenty parts of the golf swing - they can't do anything, because it's all disjunct.
Playing in tune is such a complex thing, that there are too many factors to list. It's probably just best to tell someone to play in tune and let them try to figure it out on their own. Can you imagine all of the considerations going through someone's head who isn't good at playing in tune, and trying to go through a checklist of all the instructions given to them about playing in tune while trying to actually do it?

In my opinion, with a brass instrument the most difficult in tune playing that a player does is all by themselves with no other people playing along, no accompanying instrument offering feedback, and no electronic device to stare at.

[cmccain]

I'm going to echo what others have said about other brass instruments: intermediate and professional trumpets always have a first and a third valve slide, horns have 2+ alternate fingering for most of the standard range, trombone players constantly preach some variation of "there aren't 7 positions, there are dozens or hundreds of slide positions in 7 groups." No instrument is going to be without tuning issues in one area or another.

But there is another factor here: as you lower the pitch, the notes physically get further apart, both in terms of wavelength and tubing length. Meaning that it is going to be relatively more difficult to manually bend a pitch into place and make it sound right. Obviously there are a lot of other factors including the mouthpiece and how tightly the notes slot in the horn, but the fact is that your face has to make larger physical changes on the tuba than on higher-pitches instruments to get wayward notes into place.

With all that said, tuning also relies a lot on where certain nodes lie on the horn. If I remember correctly, the pedal has no nodes, the 2nd harmonic has 1, 3rd harmonic has 2, and so on. Ideally, we could use some math to make all these nodes line up perfectly for perfect tuning. However, we also want tubas that are at least somewhat convenient to hold, manipulate, and move, and so compromises are always going to be made between getting the nodes in the right places and making a horn that is practical in shape and size.

[Mary Ann]

As both ex-pro violinist and ex-pretty decent horn player, even the violin has intonation issues because of what someone else said above -- what key are you in, what position in the chord (if it "is" a chord where that means something) and if you tune it to perfect fifths you're not in tune perfectly with the pianist on open strings, assuming the piano is properly tuned. So you learn the positions and the complexity not only of what pattern works best physically and musically for that particular phrase or sequence of phrases, but you avoid open strings when their pitches aren't exactly where they need to be. Vibrato is a life saver.

On a horn, you have both Bb and F valves, plus your right hand, as well as your chops, to accomplish the same thing. I found the intellectual approach to horn playing amazingly similar to the one for violin playing.

Tuba, compared to those, is simple. I did not say easy, I said simple. Many fewer things to do, and perhaps the hoops to be jumped through are bigger ones, but still.

[tubatodd]

I’m not sure why there’s such a stigma with main slide gadgets, but that seems to be the most logical solution,but the slide has to be long enough and the horn needs to be significantly sharp with main slide all the way in.

Fred Marzan had a GREAT idea about this many decades ago. Just put the main slide up where the player can reach it and every note can be adjusted easily.




Fun fact: My wife bought me a bunch of tuba t-shirts for Christmas. One of them was of the Marzan patent. She had NO IDEA how cool or unique it was when she bought it. I was amazed when I opened it.

[bloke]

I've both repaired and bought and flipped some piston and rotary Marzan tubas with the tune any note tuning slide over there. It's not a fun place to rest one's hand. I think it would be better to extend the mouth pipe and put a tune any note slide where the first slide is typically located. Additionally, it would be luxurious to have it self-centering with a spring system such as Reynolds used to install on the first slides of their tubas.

[humBell]

Point of order... Do i have to rant to post in this thread?

None of my groups are currently rehearsing, so i get to do what i want. And my audience of choice give my intonation the benefit of the doubt, as i am on a street corner with no one to tune to but passing traffic. If intonation is the language of western music, i got a thick accent. Isn't it loverly?

[humBell]

Fun fact: My wife bought me a bunch of tuba t-shirts for Christmas. One of them was of the Marzan patent. She had NO IDEA how cool or unique it was when she bought it. I was amazed when I opened it.

Awesome t-shirt. Where do i get one?

[tubatodd]

Fun fact: My wife bought me a bunch of tuba t-shirts for Christmas. One of them was of the Marzan patent. She had NO IDEA how cool or unique it was when she bought it. I was amazed when I opened it.

Awesome t-shirt. Where do i get one?

https://www.amazon.com/Vintage-Patent-T ... 08M3LRBRG/

[martyneilan]

I’m not sure why there’s such a stigma with main slide gadgets, but that seems to be the most logical solution,but the slide has to be long enough and the horn needs to be significantly sharp with main slide all the way in.

Fred Marzan had a GREAT idea about this many decades ago. Just put the main slide up where the player can reach it and every note can be adjusted easily.
Fun fact: My wife bought me a bunch of tuba t-shirts for Christmas. One of them was of the Marzan patent. She had NO IDEA how cool or unique it was when she bought it. I was amazed when I opened it.

Thats great for minor adjustments. Notes that are nearly a quarter tone out cannot be fixed by a slide with about 2 inches realistically usable.
Years ago I drove across several states for a 4 valve Marzan CC that looked in nearly new condition. The open notes weren't bad but the 23 combinations were way out from each other. There is no way I could have made that horn work, even with the adjustable main slide. If it had a 5th valve, I could have set the slides and had one valve combination for the super sharp 23 and another alternate valve combination for the super flat 23.

10 cents off really isn't that big of a deal but there are so many tubas out there that are 20 cents to a full quarter tone out on certain notes - and I am not talking about the flat 5th partial that is to be expected from a natural harmonic progression.

[bloke]

Swiss-design (both legacy makers) contrabass tubas are non-starters for me, due to the (two different tendencies) pretty much "no-solution-to-the-problem" epic (in particular, but also 2nd partial) 3rd partial 2-3 valve combination tuning issues.

The typical (many other makes/models made elsewhere) 2-3 issue is a flat 4th partial, which various from slightly flat (many models) to (a few models) not flat at all.
With my very large contrabass B-flat, the 4th partial 2-3 combination is slightly flat (compared to 2nd partial)...a one-inch push (de facto two inches of tubing), which is (choice of) manageable or able to be favored ("lipped"). I choose to manage it, as (unusual design) my 3rd slide is on the back, and I've set up a bar and spring-loaded the #3 slide, whereby my left hand can remain on the #1 slide at all times, while my left wrist can activate the #3 slide.

As it's a B-flat instrument (and I mostly play it in orchestras, and encounter a good bit of music written in sharp keys), there are times when I do not push in that slide for F-sharp, as first inversion D major chords (encountered quite often in the not-many-sharps keys) are "perfected" (tuned) with the F-sharp being a bit flat. Even if in other keys (and there's a prominent keyboard instrument) the "stretch tuning" of a keyboard also defines that I can leave that slide be (when playing most any bottom-of-staff F-sharp or G-flat)...though (yeah...) I do tend to pull out my MAIN slide a bit when playing with pianos or synthetic/electronic versions of pianos (as the pitches in the commonly-written range of the tuba are all going to be intentionally tuned flat on pianos).



As seen below, most of the typically-written tuba range is between 2c and 20c tuned flat on typical pianos:



bloke "Please don't hate on me, Swiss-design contrabass tuba owners...I admire all the hard work y'all do!"

[windshieldbug]

I hate to bring this up, but the problem is not with the instrument.
The problem lies with the overtone series, compounded by the temperament in use.
Equal temperament is only equally out-of-tune.

https://www.kylegann.com/tuning.html

[bloke]

There are - absolutely - models of tubas/trumpets/trombones/horns which interact in far more friendly ways to modern-era western music tuning practices.