rotary F and piston C... feel and air... consistancy

[rascaljim]

Question for some of you long time pros who have bought and sold many times over.

I am currently pretty happy with my stable of tubas. But as a result of a week in Aspen as well as some heavy contemplation, I decided I need some outside influence.

Currently, my MW2000 and MW2165 get the bulk of my work (as far as practice time) as they are my most current horns and I am at the point where I'm as comfortable with those as I had been with other tubas I had owned for awhile.

Now here's where somewhat of a variable comes in. I've had this F tuba, a miraphone 181 that I've recieved many complements on. I bought this tuba when I was also using a 186 C and had no problems getting the two horns to cooperate with each other, especially if I was not exactly balancing my practice as I like. Being they were both rotary, among other things, I didn't have any notice of things acting up.

As I'm sure many of you know, the rotary Miraphone F and the piston Meinl C's blow about as different as can be. I love my meinl C's so getting rid of them is kinda out of the question, so far.

Where I'm going with this is to consistancy. I recently played a great tuba that Warren Deck was letting one of his students at Aspen use (it was some kinda 182 or 2182 that had a real set of big valves on them... not the modifications that meinl did into production). I had a hell of a time getting the thing going as I expected it to blow in some way comparable to my F. WRONG... But I noticed when I blew it more like my 2000, everything cleared up and away I went. This is what got me to wondering if I am forcing myself to work too hard with these contrasting airstreams I am using. Of course I never noticed it before because I had put the time in to make the horns sound good, but I do come up against frusterations.

Enough rambling
Got 2c?
If you'd rather not post your answer, please email me at Rascaljim@yahoo.com

Please, I'm not looking for outside opinion, I'm hoping someone has had a similar experience or advice in the like.

Sorry for the length
Jim Langenberg

[ThomasP]

Why work harder than you have to. The only exception to that rule would be is if you like the sound enough to have to work hard to play the horn well. Kinda like the Alex philosophy. Intonation has a bad rep. with Alex, but the sound is supposedly desirable.

Ultimately your choice...

[JCradler]

Not sure if this is exactly what you're after, but here goes. I don't think that this kind of frustration can be totally avoided. It can be minimized, but different approaches to different tools will always be necessary. I recently spent about a month reacquainting myself with my Besson 983 after about 9 months of CC tuba plus rotary F tuba(virtually no Eb playing at all). Very different beasts indeed. After several weeks of E-flat playing, things started to come back. But I didn't try to think how playing that instrument was different from playing the F, more appropriately, I tried to supply what the 983 needed to sound good. Was I forgetting F tuba habits? Most likely, but I tried to focus on regaining skills rather than abandoning skills.
From your post, if I read it correctly, it appears you might want to spent more time with the 181 to keep it comfortable. Focusing on the product, rather than the process, in my opinion, is going to remove some of the hindrances that pop up.

Hope this is what you were after, if not, disregard....

[rascaljim]

As a clarification. I do fine with the tubas I have now. I get work, I advance at auditions, hell, I just got done doing Strauss 1 on it with a band a few weeks ago. Had I not tried this other horn these thoughts may have never crossed my mind. ('tempted by the fruit of another' I guess)

As the professional I'm striving to be, I am always trying to figure out ways to become even more consistant than I already am. I love my 181 and I've got the intonation under control. Actually, that was a concern I had for "the other tuba". Hence my questions. I wanted to know if anyone had a similar experience before I decide if I want to go on another tuba search.

Thankyou for the responses so far it's nice to see what other people are considering
JL

[MikeMason]

audiences and committees don't care how hard your horn is to play."play by sound not by feel"-A.J....