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Bob1062 wrote:I am currently playing my tiny Eb as the only tuba in a community band or about 60-75 players, including an average of 10 trombones! I usually feel that I could use a bigger horn, but I can still make it work.

Another way to read what you wrote there is "We need someone with a contrabass tuba to help me out in the tuba section." Then you can play Eb and not worry about doing it all by yourself. You may not even like a larger F or Eb tuba, the way you like the Eb you have now, and since it still wouldn't be the equal of a Bb contrabass, you'd have spent a lot of money making no one happy.

As for the Cerveny tubas - of course I have no idea. There are probably at least a few that are really superb, but who knows how consistent they are, out of the factory. The only tuba I would buy based on the picture is the Gronitz PE 55 Eb. You can just tell. Of course that would be a little outside my budget at this time, though.

If you're looking to really play that double, most "Bass Tuba's" (a silly distiction in my mind) are only going to cut it so far. A cerveny "Piggy" in CC or BBb is a small horn that sounds like a big horn, and won't make you push down all of the valves to play the tuba parts. Mostly they come in 4 valved versions and can be used in nearly all situations. Before the flames start, let's just think about playing in musicals, when the arranger writes "Tuba" on a part they are not looking for a light sound, generally they're looking for Sousa, and a small horn doesn't characteristically have that sound, as far as playing in Germany, I saw (BIG)F's, CC's and BBb's. Of course, one man's opinion (factually based on playing musicals for almost 20 years fulltime, six of them while living in Germany) is only one man's opinion, but of the three musicals I've recently played on the horn, an F (played by me) would not have been enough, and all 3 fit nicely on CC or BBb.
Peace.
Arnold S. Gottlieb

I played an Amati 6V F for a while -- 5+1 configuration. I believe it was equivalent to today's Cerveny 654-6M. It had a very nice rotary F sound, the low C took some finesse to play and never felt good (rather like trying to play a note with the water key held open), and the upper register tended to be flat (with common / generic intonation issues).

It could have been that my mpc was too large or too deep, but I did try a few options. I never managed the intonation issues very well, nor the low C. But I did like the sound, which IIRC seemed a bit bigger than the Yamaha YFB-621 I traded it for (maybe it didn't have a bigger sound, maybe just darker).

Liked the sound, but this particular horn did have several challenges to cope with. This particular horn had a "quint" 5th valve (a drop of a perfect 5th), activated with the right hand thumb. 4th valve dropped ou to C, 5th valve by itself dropped you to BBb. Interesting setup.

Cheers,

Bob1062 wrote:Though I understand the usefulness of a flat half-step 6th valve, I don't want any more than 5, and I would rather have them operated by the right hand so that the left is "free" to hold the horn, turn pages, and adjust slides... I would almost rather have 4 valves than 1 left-handed valve.

Unless you plan to be using #6 full time, I'm not sure that I see the problem...

And you could always entreat bloke to build you a helicon!

Baltimore brass currently has an old Amati/Cerveny 4 rotary valve Eb tuba for about $1500. It's worth at least calling and asking Dave about it.

Bob1062,
I would look for an Eb first-used.
I found a 1940 King Efer with a 24 inch recording bell on E-Bay for cheap.It has great false tones (three banger) and the 8th partial is the only note so flat I have to sneak up on it.
I would then look for a used Bb King or Conn.
Best of luck!
tubatooter1940
www.johnreno.com/