A mouthpiece I never knew of before: the Besson 8G

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imperialbari
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A mouthpiece I never knew of before: the Besson 8G

Post by imperialbari »

Leland has come out of the closet long ago, so I will dare to out myself also:

I am into instruments pitched in G!

#5 arrived Tuesday and #6 has been paid with a scheduled arrival this week.

The King K20 nominally is a two valve bugle, but actually it is really good trumpet sadly lacking the 3rd valve.

The Alexander G descant horn has a very different shape, but has the exact same pitch as the K20

The Kanstul .547 marching baritone is very playable, and the pitchfinder device partially makes up for the lack of a 4th valve.

The pre-1920 Hawkes & Son is a heavily decorated lightweight bassbone. Very flexible on the embouchure, but a heavy work-out on the slide arm.

Yesterdays arrival, a 1960 Besson Westminster bassbone, is very heavy in comparison. The slides are quite good in each their own right, but I will have to apply a bit of my slide alignment wizzardry some day, when the mood is right for such daring task.

The old Hawkes came with an extremely shallow original mouthpiece in the Bach 15C league. I use my belowed modified Denis Wick 4AY for that horn.

The Westminster came with something hitherto unknown to me (after all I have been around brasses for some decades): the Besson 8G.

It is in the Bach 2G league with a very deep funnel type cup. The rim is flat, which for me is a huge advantage over the Bach's and Schilke's. The rim is quite narrow, also to my liking. The inner edge is a bit too round for my taste, but no way as "diffuse" as with the large Bach's and Schilke's.

And the hammer is:

It has a small bore stem!

A lot of experimentation will be needed, but this Besson 8G appears to be ideal mouthpiece for a lot of my narrow receiver conical brasses from the UK, the US, Belgium, Germany, and Czechia.

Klaus
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Billy M.
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Post by Billy M. »

I've felt that King K-90 contrabass was the ultimate in marching brass because of it's wonderful sound and excellent playability.

But King isn't done.

Ive honestly felt that their new innovative BBb contrabass has a remarkably similar 'bugle' style sound to it. It has definitely been given the nod by me so to speak.
Romans 3:23-24

Billy Morris
Rudolf Meinl Model 45, Musikmesse Horn
Boosey & Hawkes Imperial Eb (19" Bell)
1968 Besson New Standard Eb (15" Bell)
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