Besson 788 equivalent?
Posted: Tue Sep 06, 2005 2:01 pm
In a nutshell, the question here is to find out what tubas are equivalent to a Besson 788. The details follow:
My son just started 6th grade this year -- the first year they do band around here. Students are told to make a list of their top three choices for instruments. Even though there is quite an assortment of instruments around the house, my son has not been drawn to any of them. But he has seen and heard enough to know that, if he is going to get some hands-on exposure to music, he prefers playing brass. Through experimentation he discovered that brass in the baritone/euphonium/trombone group is the easiest for him to get some kind of vaguely musical sound, so he listed his preferences as baritone, tuba, trombone. The band teacher didn't know I already had one of those oval Chinese "euphoniums" (note the quotes) ready to be beat up by a student. So the teacher sent a beat up Besson 788 home with my son.
Oh! A new tuba for ME to mess around with! I found the compact size very handy; one could get addicted to something this compact very easily ... if the sound is OK. And the sound was OK; very OK.
What is prompting the post here is: My current 3/4 size is the job sold by Bandfolio. I got it back when Chinese tubas were just beginning to make an appearance. I guess the Bandfolio proprietor was in a "tell ya what I'm gonna do" mood at the time and made me an offer that was difficult to pass up for somebody looking to get one's tuba feet wet. It turns out that the Bandfolio tuba is OK. Sort of like a Dodge Dart with AM radio, standard transmission, and no air conditioning. Not elegant, but it will get you where you need to go. The valve linkage is a little clickety, so your blistering performance of Carnival of Venice (yeah sure, maybe in my next life) might be a little noisy. Intonation is comparable to most decent 3-valve tubas; both high and low response are fine. One of the more attractive properties is that it only weighs 16 pounds. This was a godsend for me since, due to the meddling of Navin Johnson, I had to suspend my cat juggling act; I was able to replace it with a tuba juggling act. The molded plastic case adds little additional weight, and it fits exactly -- and I do mean EXACTLY -- between the passenger door and transmission hump of a 2002 Toyota Tacoma pickup.
(Stay with me ...)
Well, the arrival of the Besson 788 confirmed something I've wondered about: Does the thinner brass of the lighter weight tubas vibrate enough to dissipate the energy of the lower fundamental tones? The comparison of the Bandfolio with the Besson would indicate that does in fact happen. The two tubas were remarkably similar in intonation and response, but the Besson had a little more low fundamental in its tone even though I think the Bandfolio is a bigger bore and generally bigger tuba. The tone along with the wonderfully compact size of the Besson 788 has prompted me to put on my list of things to do "one of these days" the acquisition of one of those little sweeties or something like it.
Given that a search of TubeNet (both old and new) for "Besson 788" turns up absolutely nothing, I take it that this model is not a common household item. So, I am asking the wise and learned tubarotti of TubeNet to suggest worthy alternatives to put on my list of little tubas that don't sound like little tubas.
By the way, even though the Bandfolio is very light (as tubas go), it is not all that compact as one can see in the picture of it along size an Allora 186 on my website.
My son just started 6th grade this year -- the first year they do band around here. Students are told to make a list of their top three choices for instruments. Even though there is quite an assortment of instruments around the house, my son has not been drawn to any of them. But he has seen and heard enough to know that, if he is going to get some hands-on exposure to music, he prefers playing brass. Through experimentation he discovered that brass in the baritone/euphonium/trombone group is the easiest for him to get some kind of vaguely musical sound, so he listed his preferences as baritone, tuba, trombone. The band teacher didn't know I already had one of those oval Chinese "euphoniums" (note the quotes) ready to be beat up by a student. So the teacher sent a beat up Besson 788 home with my son.
Oh! A new tuba for ME to mess around with! I found the compact size very handy; one could get addicted to something this compact very easily ... if the sound is OK. And the sound was OK; very OK.
What is prompting the post here is: My current 3/4 size is the job sold by Bandfolio. I got it back when Chinese tubas were just beginning to make an appearance. I guess the Bandfolio proprietor was in a "tell ya what I'm gonna do" mood at the time and made me an offer that was difficult to pass up for somebody looking to get one's tuba feet wet. It turns out that the Bandfolio tuba is OK. Sort of like a Dodge Dart with AM radio, standard transmission, and no air conditioning. Not elegant, but it will get you where you need to go. The valve linkage is a little clickety, so your blistering performance of Carnival of Venice (yeah sure, maybe in my next life) might be a little noisy. Intonation is comparable to most decent 3-valve tubas; both high and low response are fine. One of the more attractive properties is that it only weighs 16 pounds. This was a godsend for me since, due to the meddling of Navin Johnson, I had to suspend my cat juggling act; I was able to replace it with a tuba juggling act. The molded plastic case adds little additional weight, and it fits exactly -- and I do mean EXACTLY -- between the passenger door and transmission hump of a 2002 Toyota Tacoma pickup.
(Stay with me ...)
Well, the arrival of the Besson 788 confirmed something I've wondered about: Does the thinner brass of the lighter weight tubas vibrate enough to dissipate the energy of the lower fundamental tones? The comparison of the Bandfolio with the Besson would indicate that does in fact happen. The two tubas were remarkably similar in intonation and response, but the Besson had a little more low fundamental in its tone even though I think the Bandfolio is a bigger bore and generally bigger tuba. The tone along with the wonderfully compact size of the Besson 788 has prompted me to put on my list of things to do "one of these days" the acquisition of one of those little sweeties or something like it.
Given that a search of TubeNet (both old and new) for "Besson 788" turns up absolutely nothing, I take it that this model is not a common household item. So, I am asking the wise and learned tubarotti of TubeNet to suggest worthy alternatives to put on my list of little tubas that don't sound like little tubas.
By the way, even though the Bandfolio is very light (as tubas go), it is not all that compact as one can see in the picture of it along size an Allora 186 on my website.