TubaForum.net

Not really. Well. Sort of.

Something I just realized about myself the other day.

I haven't played BBb tuba full time for 20 years. I've been on CC and F since then. HOWEVER. When I pick up any tuba and play some warm up notes/exercises, I always start on Bb. Scales? Start on Bb. Tone exercise? Bb. Arpeggios? Bb.

The only exception is lip slurs. But even when I played Bb tuba, I didn't always start on Bb for those. Always open first, and then through the valve combinations. But also I never start right up with lip slurs.

Point is, even after all these years, the first note I produce on my horn when I pick it up is a Bb. No idea why.

I'm surprised nobody had complicated philosophy to suggest about this.

Seems like I don't do this when I pick up a tuba at home, but I do at band rehearsal, maybe because the trumpets and trombones already set an ambience.

very closely related:

When I start playing a few things before I start reading any music and my mind's really not in it, it's still not unusual for me to put down two valves and think A instead of G, even though I've been doing the B flat thing for a fairly good while now. When I make that error, the product isn't as good, even though I'm just sort of doing some preliminary playing. When I start and my mind's in the right place and I actually think G when putting down two valves without having to correct myself, everything is going better. By the same token, if I'm off track and I get myself quickly straightened out, everything is then just fine.

When starting to play, I use a set of patterns as home base. These patterns get used regardless of the key of instrument. For example, if I pick up an F, these patterns start on F. If I pick up a BBb, they start on BBb. This allows me to remember that particular instrument. When I start reading printed music, that’s when everything else kicks in, with any luck!

I’ve finally solved this debate!

The answer is you need to own both.

I might end up there, owning both. Never an F again -- don't need one with the NStar.
whatever I pick up, the first note I play is the open note an octave above the pedal. Then I do a pattern as an initial warmup, that fits the key of what I'm holding.

At the risk of appearing to go on and on, what I was trying to explain in my previous post is that if my mind is thinking about the wrong pitch even though I'm mashing buttons and playing a pitch that's coming out of the instrument, it just doesn't work as well, and I'm talking about non-music reading playing. I need to be aware of the correct pitch for whatever reason.

bloke wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2024 8:05 am At the risk of appearing to go on and on, what I was trying to explain in my previous post is that if my mind is thinking about the wrong pitch even though I'm mashing buttons and playing a pitch that's coming out of the instrument, it just doesn't work as well, and I'm talking about non-music reading playing. I need to be aware of the correct pitch for whatever reason.

We, you and I, have a friend that that used to put a sticky note on the bell near the mouthpiece receiver telling him what tuba he was picking up when using one that was used less frequently in the rotation. Prevented a derailing event. Correct button mashing fail safe!

A lot of key-of-tuba switching is tactile, for me:

CC tuba is usually four or five valves, right hand

F tuba is five valves right hand OR 4+1 (or 4+2). 5+1 F tubas screw with my brain, because I am never thinking about my left hand alone lowering a note by a flat half step. I learned F tuba on a 4+1, so I am really wanting to mash down 4 plus left hand to get a low Bb, whereas on a 5+1 F tuba, that will net me a nice low B!

Eb tuba is 3+1

BBb tuba is (usually) 3 valve sousaphone


I am playing at the Great American Brass Band Festival this week on a tiny little German four rotary valve Eb tuba, and I am so used to a tiny little rotary tuba being F that I am inadvertently reverting to F fingers on some notes. Pencil, pencil, pencil!

lately, the content on the other site has looked interesting

assumed sarcasm and responded as such.
deleted previous comments with apologies.

arpthark wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2024 8:34 am I am playing at the Great American Brass Band Festival this week on a tiny little German four rotary valve Eb tuba, and I am so used to a tiny little rotary tuba being F that I am inadvertently reverting to F fingers on some notes. Pencil, pencil, pencil!

All my tubas, in three keys, are now little German rotaries (or very similarly sized, anyway, in the scheme of tuba sizes), so this happens a lot for me…

100 years ago, I used to Poo-Poo BBb tubas. The current state of horn building is SO good, that MANY horn builders make GREAT BBb tubas. So, I say, "Does the instrument make the sound you are after?" If so, THAT'S your horn. And key be damned.

Early on and for decades, Vincent Bach and quite a few other trumpet makers associated bore and overall size with length. I'm not sure that they were on the wrong track. Later, it became apparent that trumpet players desired that most of their trumpets be as big as what seems to be the optimal/most popular size of B-flat trumpets, and that's what are offered for sale today... basically a bunch of different lengths of "fake B-flat trumpets".

I wasn't keenly aware of the hollow type of sound of large C tubas so much (though I was somewhat aware of it) until I began spending time with B-flat tubas in the last very few years, but many really large C tubas offer sort of a hollow type of resonance, whereby something is missing. I believe that's why I was attracted to the model 5450 C tuba, because it offered some "fist" in the sound, rather than a the typical large C tuba "woo" type of sound. Another C tuba that caught my interest was the so-called five quarter (defacto six quarter) Rudolf Meinl, and for the same reason - whereby it's characteristic sound offers some vibrancy, although it's not quite my personally chosen vibrancy profile, but now I'm really getting into esoterics and walking on a razor-thin line towards B.S.
186 C tubas work out well (as far as plenty of vibrancy) as do the 188 and those smaller than 186 in that same series - though the 185 and 184 models' intonation tendencies are somewhat curious.
One thing is almost universally agreed upon, which is a same model C tuba is considerably less work to play then a sister B flat, but...
(I believe that) along with less work less comes less of a bouquet of sound, and that's from those of us who are only capable of producing somewhat meager sounds all the way through those of us who are capable of producing angelic and universe-moving type of sounds.

wow... The crap that I just typed above really starts looking like some central European B-flat snobbery (along with the rest of the nonsense typed in this response), but - just for fun - I'll go ahead and post it.

Even I, the violinist-tuba player, have noted that the longer the bugle the more "manly" the sound that can be gotten out of it, assuming one's air supply remains sufficient to fill the tube. A really fine CC player with a really fine CC can get a really fine sound, but that same player on a BBb is going to get a BBb sound, which to my little ears is more "manly" sounding.

Thanks for saying something that men are not supposed to say.

The first production yorkophone was the Holton 345. They had made instruments of that basic shape and size in the past, but actually a couple of significant parts on the 345 were altered from their ancient models, including the large upper bow - which is probably about an inch narrower bend than their old 6/4 models. I'm not certain about this, but I also tend to suspect that the bottom bow overall length on the 345 is truncated, compared to the old Holtons. Besides those changes, they altered the valve section to mimic the basically one-off CSO York tuba.
I suspect that they came out with that model so as to get Arnold Jacobs to own and occasionally play one, because they were interested in the Chicago principal brass all owning Holton instruments. (We've all seen a copy of the old pen and ink magazine advertisement on Facebook and other places, have we not?)
I'm not particularly convinced that - as a business - they were not particularly interested in manufacturing and selling those things (just as I'm not particularly convinced that Yamaha is particularly interested in selling model 826 tubas.)
The vast majority of Holton 345 tubas were built in B-flat with either three or four valves, and a very few of them were built in C with five valves. I've played three or four factory C versions and numerous B-flat versions. The B-flat versions always offer more gusto/majesty in the sonority, and the C versions always offer a more hollow type of sound - as described in previous posts in this thread.
Johnny-come-lately yorkophone makers - with Hirsbrunner - I believe - being the second one around 1979 or so (just about the time that Holton shelved the 345 model) didn't deem it practical to make both a B-flat and C version, because there didn't seem to be a market for B-flat versions during that era, and they were so very costly ($10,000 in 1980...check an inflation calculator: easily = $40,000 today) that they likely couldn't imagine schools purchasing them - even if secondary schools had been interested in outfitting their tuba players with C length instruments.
What I'm saying is the old Holtons offer one of the few A/B length sonority comparisons, though it's pretty difficult to find a C-length Holton instrument to do such a comparison.

Mary Ann wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2024 7:03 pm Even I, the violinist-tuba player, have noted that the longer the bugle the more "manly" the sound that can be gotten out of it, assuming one's air supply remains sufficient to fill the tube. A really fine CC player with a really fine CC can get a really fine sound, but that same player on a BBb is going to get a BBb sound, which to my little ears is more "manly" sounding.

“A manly sound, but ladies like it too.” For our younger members, the video below might explain much about how our generation turned out like it did.