There seems to be a belief - among some tuba players - that "bigger is louder" (...so why don't 6/4 tubas drown out bass trombones, and why can cimbassos ACTUALLY drown out bass trombone...??
) Saint-Saëns' French tuba - aka "saxhorn basse" - (as we all know) was an extra-large bore six-valve challenging-intonation 8-feet-bugle baritone...so I figure that a 12-foot-bugle much-larger-bore tuba with a six-inch-larger bell easy-to-play-in-tune tuba is plenty large enough.
I believe you will hear it (on this microphone-in-the-balcony recording) just fine.
Was I "blasting my guts out"? Though the video is not great nor zoomed in on low brass - and I'm actually sitting down in a "hole", I'm pretty sure that it's easily ascertained that I was not "blasting my guts out".
Further, were it that I was "blasting my guts out", [1] it would not have sounded the same, and [2] the tuba (actually) would not have been as easy to hear in the mix.
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fwiw...This was a remarkable performance. There was ONE rehearsal, and slated were this plus a nearly-ten-minutes-long new commissioned overture. We really were only able to go through the overture once, and through this symphony also only once, and we performed the entire symphony, and not just this final movement. Further, the "covid seating" (on stage) made things all the more challenging.
Peter (music director) afterward - on my way out the door, asked me "Where were you sitting? I always heard you, but never saw you...??"
Admittedly, I really could not see him, either, and (mostly) played from sound, as his stick was not really visible to me.
Administrators:
Move this to "media" if you choose, though the actual topic - at least, in my view - is "underestimating the sonic weight and carrying power of F tubas".
) I've been way-way down the 6/4 C rabbit hole, and have found my way back out of it.
