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Dear Colleagues;

I am currently looking at a trove of old instruments that are part of the history of our band club. Its a community based club of amateur brass band players on the same lines as British Brass Bands and Italian Bande di Fiato. It has its origin in mid 19th century Malta.

Malta was always under heavy Italian cultural influence but also a British colony exposed to the military regimental brass bands.

Kindly allow me to send you a picture of what appears to be an old tenor horn which I believe is one of the earliest instruments of the same band.

Can someone identify the instrument and help with the date of manufacture?

Philip Sciortino

It has had quite a hard life! The first thing which occurs to me: Where is the tuning slide? The picture doesn't make it clear that the slide beneath the 3rd valve slide actually moves and is clear of the bottom bow.

Based on the flat spring on the water key and the style of rotary valve bumpers (the corks being attached to the moving linkage arm and resting on the posts on the casing), my best guess is early 20th century Italian, maybe Rampone. Italian brasses always seemed a bit behind the rest of Europe in some of their manufacturing methods; if this were a Bohemian instrument I would hazard a guess right around the turn of the century, but maybe give the Italians a couple extra years to catch up.

Certainly after the late 1880's due to the lyre holder--it's square, not round as in earlier designs. Also, those earlier do not have original water keys.

Thanks to all;

I understand this is a baritone horn, is it?

Hard to tell without something for scale. It could be a really skinny Italian F tuba or a skinny Bb baritone-ish instrument. The valve circuits look a little long to be in Bb, but again, hard to tell without a sense of scale. How tall is the instrument?

Philip Sciortino wrote: Sun Nov 09, 2025 3:57 pm Thanks to all;

I understand this is a baritone horn, is it?

Baritone or, more likely, a tenor [not the British Brassband version of a tenor, but the 19th century definition.]
Not a whole lot of difference, frankly, mostly bore.

Could this be very similar to my instrument? https://mimo-international.com/MIMO/det ... &_lg=ko-KR