Sub Contra Tuba ... HELP???

[Donn]

So, sounds like if you want one, you might have to have one made. Are conical bores more or less constant up to the bell section? I'm wondering if you'd have to make all 36 feet of the bugle from scratch, or could use a BBb tuba for the small end and make the remaining 20 feet or so out of fiberglass.

[tubatooter1940]

Harold,
Have you nothing to offer in the way of encouragement?

[Allen]

The Harvard University Band still has its BBBb tuba. They bring it out for special occasions. I have heard it played a few times, and I can say that musically, it's terrible. However, it's a great prop for some good showmanship.

One Harvard Band concert I attended (in Boston's Symphony Hall) used this tuba. Before one piece, they got the instrument out, with lots of people helping to move it as if it weighed 100 tons. The entire clarinet section cowered in fright as this massive instrument was moved into place. But, where was the tubist, that person of such magnificent accomplishment who could master such a beast? Suddenly, there was a commotion at the back of the hall, and a three-person parade headed for the stage. First was a drummer, playing a good street beat. Then, there was the tubist (all hail!) who was simply strolling behind the drummer -- he was too important to stay in step. Last was a boy in a sort of bellhop's uniform, marching along carrying a large velvet cushion, upon which was the Great One's mouthpiece.

The procession reached the stage, and you can imagine the further folderol, bowing and looks of awe. Finally, the Great One deigned to put his mouthpiece into the monster tuba, a crew of several bandies braced themselves against the tuba, and the music began. It was "Them Basses." I wish I could say that the sounds from that BBBb tuba were impressive, but the best part of the show was already over. Did I have fun? Of course!

Cheers,
Allen Walker

[Dean E]

Here are some subcontra tubas collected from the web.


Harvard Subcontra BBBb


Normus-not further identified


Unknown

[Chuck(G)]

My intent if this posts is to ultimately locate and purchase a BBb sub contra tuba (I know they are floating around out there) I too know that they are quite obscure and rare. I require the help of all those tuba 'bigwigs' and the lurkers that may have knowledge of the whereabouts of one. Also, some info on what brands produced these mommoth horns. Any help or inkling of a contact or even a starting point for me would be nice. Alright now guys and gals, go to it.

From everything I've heard, the subcontras are only barely playable. Why not get a nice mic and octave doubler and huge old amplifier and sput the rig on your current horn? You'll actually be able to play that.

[Chuck(G)]

Having never encountered such a beast myself I have to wonder;

Are these horns really barely playable?

OR

Is the difference in size so great as to make them seem barely playable? How would a euphonium player feel using their mouthpiece in massive Rudy Meinl 6/4 BBb?

If, as Mr. Jacobs said, a note of a given frequency will require about the same amount of air whether it's played on a french horn or a tuba, you have to wonder if it's humanly possible to produce a good clear sound on a subcontrabass tuba. Or for that matter, if it's possible to produce accurate articulation at the lower range.

A short time ago, there was a thread about Roger Bobo saying that BBb tubas are not playable by the average human. I'm not sure I agree with him, but a subcontra would seem to take his argument to the extreme limit.

The other aspect is that as far as I know, all of these instruments were built as novelty items and not as serious musical instruments. One can only speculate how good the intonation is.

[jmerring]

I have a march by Paul Lavalle and Joe Tarto, titled "Big Joe, the Tuba." It was supposedly written with the Harvard horn in mind. Whether that is true or not, I am not certain. When I got the music, I thought I saw a descriptive page referring to it, but I can't locate that darn page, now. BTW, the march is incredibly simple - along the lines of "Them Basses" or " Rolling Thunder."

[Mikelynch]

Big Joe the Tuba was not written for the Harvard subcontrabass tuba, but was written for the King tubas with an even taller wrap that the pit tubas (roughly 7 1/2 feet tall). These were also known as Lopezophones (possibly with hyphens) for the Vincent Lopez orchestra (with whom Tarto played at times--I do not know how long or how frequently). That is the horn identifed with the Cities Service Band and the Band of America as "Big Joe". There were at least three of these built, and possibly more, but they are simple BBb's in an unconventional wrap.

To my my knowledge, there are only 4 actual subcontrabass tubas in existence: the Harvard and Carl Fischer "sister" tubas in BBBb, the Hoffnung tuba in CCC (though it does have a tuning slide extension slide to put it in BBBb), and the Amati FFF, pictured in this thread. There is a helicon at the Travelers Restaurant and Tuba Museum in Michigan which is identified as an EEEb, but it has been to long since I have seen a picture to know if that nomenclature is correct.

I think Harold's advice is pretty correct. It is not likely that any of the above tubas will be available.

Mike Lynch

[Steve Marcus]

Hmmm...$50 to purchase one of the rare subcontrabass tubas...

That rivals the legend, albeit true, of a certain someone buying what would ultimately become one of the illustrious CSO Yorks for $175.

[LoyalTubist]

Or a story I heard, when I was in high school, about a girl my age who bought some used freeway signs at an auction because she thought they would be made of plywood and she could build her little brother a treehouse with them. She won the bid--only $50! CalTrans delivered the signs to her backyard--for free. There wasn't enough room for them. And they were made of thick aluminum. She actually had to pay someone to haul the signs away--over $300 in 1974!

(The point here is naivete, which is not necessarily a bad thing.)

[jacobg]

In the book "Bands of America", by Harry W. Schwartz, the author recounts how around the turn of the century many touring bands tried to one-up each other by building "The World's Largest Tuba". The trombonist Frederick Innes was one of those to attempt this, although the book seems to say that his tuba was an enormous BBb (not a subcontra) with a 45" bell. Other bands followed this pursuit, leading to a real BBBb, (I don't remember whose it was), as well as an instrument billed as the world's largest bass, which was really a 25 foot long megaphone, with no valves or mouthpiece.
Interesting book; maybe someone could copy out the relevant passages for tubenet?

[tubatooter1940]

A sub contra would be murder to transport and probably inconvienient to play but imagine how many kids would gather around just to see you blow that monster!

[Daniel C. Oberloh]

To my my knowledge, there are only 4 actual subcontrabass tubas in existence: the Harvard and Carl Fischer "sister" tubas in BBBb, the Hoffnung tuba in CCC (though it does have a tuning slide extension slide to put it in BBBb), and the Amati FFF, pictured in this thread. Mike Lynch

I seem to recall a listing in the 1975 Guinness Book of World Records showing the worlds largest brass instrument. It was a BBBb four rotary valve tuba. There was also a picture in the book of this horn on a stage. If memory serves it was in the possession of a circus in South Africa. I have no more details to share but it would be interesting to find out more on this particular instrument and its current whereabouts?


Daniel C. Oberloh
Oberloh Woodwind and Brass Works
www.oberloh.com

[Mikelynch]

Dan,
I could be wrong, but I think you are thinking of the Hoffnung horn (only three rotary valves). That horn was in the Guiness book (erroneously) at one time (at about that period), and was in South Africa at one time.

I say erroneously, because unless one puts clarifications like "playable by one person", then the Amati wins by seemingly any measure. The other three can then argue about the metric used to determine which is the second largest tuba in the world (length x bore of tubing, volumetric displacement, weight, size of the box required to hold it...).

Generally, on the subcontras, I think it's safe to say that extension of the low range isn't an issue, and having alternative fingerings available with a 4th valve may be the least of one's concerns...

Mike Lynch

[Daniel C. Oberloh]

Hey Mike,
The pic in the 1975 (maybe 73?) paper-back book shows a four rotary tuba standing upright on a stages with a few other standard size horns on display that looks much like a way oversized Mirafone 186 with out a wreath on the bell (standard spun bead). Could it be possible that Boland and Fuchs made two of such a horn? I think it is possible. Sure do wish I wish I could locate that book.


Daniel C. Oberloh
Oberloh Woodwind and Brass Works
Seattle, WA

www.oberloh.com

[Daniel C. Oberloh]

No. That one is the one made by B&F that I mentioned but it has been in the Amati company's keeping for a long time. The horn I refer to was in South Africa in 1975 according to the GBWRs.

I need to find that damn book

Dan

[iiipopes]

I found this colorful exerpt at:
http://www.jazzprofessional.com/ronspages/dankworth.htm

The tuba player was a man named Ron Snyder. Ron was only a mediocre tuba player, but they were thin on the ground, and he was the only one John could find. There was one other tuba player in London capable of playing jazz phrasing, and his name was Alfie Reece. Alfie was working with Billy Cotton’s band, as far as I remember, and he was the only one ever booked on tuba in the studio sessions. Ron was very elegant, always well-dressed, and he seemed to know the names of all the most expensive call-girls in the West End. For some reason he bought a giant sousaphone that had been especially made for John Phillip Sousa, and which had, for many years, graced the basement entrance of Paxman’s music shop in Soho. He wound up in Johannesburg later on, and became credited in the Guinness Book of Records as having the biggest tuba in the world. 

[Dean E]

The Dutch Tuba Site asserts that Gerald Hoffnung was pictured playing a EEEb.

"no. 15 Gerald Hoffnung playing EEb (or EEEb, if you're british) subcontrabass tuba. It is pitched between the BBb contrabass and the BBBb double bass."
www.tuba.is.nl/pic11-20.html

Wikipedia has this to say under "Tuba." I don't know how accurate the info is because readers may edit Wikipedia articles. We can probably sleep peacefully, however, because I see that Rick Denny has made some edits.

"Though extremely rare, there have been larger BBBb subcontrabass tubas created. There were at least four known examples created. The first two were built by the Gustav Besson on the suggestion of American Bandmaster John Philip Sousa. The monster instruments were not completed until just after Sousa's death. Later, in the 1950's British musician Gerald Hoffnung [commissioned] the London firm of Paxman to create a subcontrabass tuba for use in his comedic music festivals. These three instruments were all pitched in BBBb, one octave below the standard Bb tuba. Also, a tuba pitched in FFF was made in Kraslice by Bohland & Fuchs probably during 1910 or 1911 and was destined for the World Exhibition in New York in 1913. This tuba is "playable", but two persons are needed; one to operate the valves and one to blow into the mouthpiece."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuba

The Wikipedia site has links to photos.

[Mikelynch]

Dean,
You just can't trust those Dutch tubists... <JUST>

They must have assumed that a British player would just have to have an E(EE)b horn. But the Hoffnung instrument is definitely a CCC, with an optional slide to BBBb.

But they may be more accurate than Wikipedia (there's only so much Rick can set the world straight on, and so little time...). The Hoffnung instrument was not built by Paxman (but by R. Sanders of Wolfstein), and it pretty clearly pre-dates the 50's. But it was, at least, stored in the basement of Paxman at one time.

That storage in the basement at Paxman resulted in the visible modification of the horn. In the linked picture of Hoffnung, the horn has a fixed bell. Paxman was remodeled at one point, resulting in an opening too small for the tuba to exit the basement. The horn was then made into a detachable bell, as shown in later pictures, in order for it to be removed from the basement. That alteration had been made by the mid-60's at least (the first time I saw a photo of the instrument). It would seem that some basic carpentry would have been a more conventional solution..

The speculation about one or more of these subcontrabass instruments having been for or at the request of Sousa seems to be an urban myth of the tuba kind... None of the Sousa scholars of whom I am aware have found any references to the use of, or request for (etc.) any of the subcontrabass tubas. Nevertheless, several stories are repeated with great (but so far as I know, totally undocumented) details as to the connection of the Hoffnung, Harvard and Carl Fischer tubas with Sousa. So far as I know, the urban myth has not yet expanded to provide the same back story for the Amati tuba.



Mike Lynch

[Dean E]

Wikipedia has this to say under "Tuba." I don't know how accurate the info is because readers may edit Wikipedia articles. We can probably sleep peacefully, however, because I see that Rick Denny has made some edits.

The Wikipedia site has links to photos.

Hmm.... Unless Rick went in after me, I'm actually the one who contributed that paragraph to Wikipedia. I wrote it with the knowledge I recalled reading somewhere, but if I am mistaken please feel free to make the necessary edits.

That is some good work, Robert. Frankly, I'm a Wikipedia virgin, clueless as to determining authors and editors.