TubeNet

Greetings!

Here starts the list of questions that I mentioned in my introduction:

In the four months that I've been practicing I now have a better range than I did 23 years ago after playing for 13 years. At least 3 of those new notes in my range are due to reading TubeNet and learning about "the sound of one lip flapping" - the Ab, A, and Bb at the bottom & beyond of the piano, using only the lower lip to play them. No, those 3 notes aren't pretty, but it's more than I ever had before. More to the point, I can comfortably play the E1 (123) and Eb1 (open). I struggled with the E1 (123) way back when, and Eb1 was out of the question. The equipment differences are these: today I play a Conn 22K fiberglass sousaphone with a Conn #2 mouthpiece; back then it was either a King brass sousaphone (model unknown) or a Miraphone tuba (4 rotary valves, model unknown), each with a Bach 24W. The question, then, is: does the equipment make the difference, or am I off to a good (re)start?

Thanks for any help,

Perry

I think the difference is on the user end.

Welcome to the board, Perry! As you have probably been lurking before coming out [go ahead, admit it!], you know this is a place populated with people that really try to help each other. I'm sure there will be lots of opinions given. Mine is that, like you, I came back after a similar layoff and I found that I was just so much hungrier to succeed than way back when. I work harder for everything now, but it is so much more satisfying now, which makes me work harder and I appreciate it more. There are an awful lot of us who have come back after a long hiatus and are enjoying the heck out of playing again! Hope to hear more from you.

Your expanded lower range partially may have to do with larger equipment, partially with your coming back tension free to the instrument.

Unless well schooled and supervised through their development many players tend to develop bad habits, among these tensions. As I have seen it, these tensions come up, when players try to perform at a level, where their technical development doesn’t suffice.

You have come back to the tuba, because you want to play the sounds you have in your ears, and nobody forces you. That is a better starting point.

Klaus

Klaus is right, but back then the 24AW was probably a tad smaller in diameter, more to "spec" than the current models, which are notoriously larger. So the small mouthpiece didn't help matters much, and for some people its wide rim, although comfortable, does not help flexibility.

King souzys have good false pedal tones, and depending on the particular horn, may or may not have good true pedal tones.

A 186 is a 186. My 186 is from 1971, and the only thing holding back its pedal tones is operator limitation.

Welcome back to the trenches. I was out for about two decades before coming back after a circulation clotting issue basically ended all the weekend bar gigs. Yes, I have about a dozen guitars and basses of all kinds, with all the matching amplifiers, and I'm just as prone when alone playing for pleasure now to pick up one of my tubas as I am one of my guitars.

Thanks everyone for your responses.

@ scottw: yes, I'll have to admit to lurking, albeit irregularly.

@ ehlutzcem: looking back on it, I think I was of the One True Mouthpiece school of thought. Not the correct mouthpiece for the horn, but for me, the player. Reading here on TubeNet has broken me of that attitude. Just how broken, you will see in my next post. And as for fiberglass souzies, I have only these experiences: the bell-less King that was my practice horn from 5th to 12th grade (practice, ha! it was a dust trap); and the Conn I now own. I don't remember how that King sounded, but the Conn seems at least on par with my alma mater's brass Jupiters. (they have a wonderful alumni band event!)

@ Klaus: I would never have thought of tension as a factor, but that's why I'm here to learn.

@iiipopes: you need to teach me more about pedal tones, false and true (please)

On a 3-valve souzy, as you go down from open BBb down to 1+2+3 low E natural, the notes are fingered in the usual way. After that, on a lot of horns, if you relax your embouchure and focus the corners, you can then get an Eb the next half-step down with open valves. This is called a "false pedal" or "privileged" tone, because even though the note has pitch and center of tone, it is not in the harmonic series. The physical reasons why some horns will play these tones and others won't is actually still a matter of debate from the physics end of things.

But, since it is in tune, it is possible on some tubas and souzys to play this low Eb open, then D 2nd, then Db 1st, then C 1+2 or 3, and B nat 2+3, then the "true" pedal BBb, one octave down from the conventional 2nd ledger line and a space BBb, as open valves. Some really good tubists (I am not among them) can even get true pedal tones below this down a few notes fingered with conventional fingerings.

This lowest BBb is called a "true" pedal, because the wavelength of the note corresponds to the length of the tubing from mouthpiece to bell rim, which is not the case with the "false pedal" or "privileged" tones.

Other tubas and souzys, depending on the bracing arrangements, tubing wraps, and where the nodes and anti-nodes, or the rarefaction and compression points of the sound waves, traverse the valve block and various points in the wrap and bracings, just will not resonate one or more of these notes at all.

I'd like to throw in a few comments here. I love to play pedal notes, and it's taken me a few years to learn that they should be used sparingly. Much of the time they can muddy the sound instead of enhancing it.

Some horns have wonderful false pedal tones and some stink. I've had good luck with most sousaphones, for some reason. Not all tubas have good pedals; I personally have better results with piston horns than with rotary. I bought a huge CC Cerveny 601 when I started playing again; you'd think that the open false pedal would be a low F, but it was instead a quarter-tone between F# and G, which made the pedal range almost unusable. The King BBb that I owned next had a mediocre (but well in-tune) open low Eb; the pedal range usually sounded thin but decent, but it could respond unpredictably. Conn2XJ tubas usually have great pedals. The easiest and strongest false pedals I've ever gotten were on a Holton 345.

While you're working chromatically down to stretch your low range, you might try playing pedal BBb 1+3 instead of open. Sometimes it helps. You might also try shifting to mouthpiece up instead of down to get more of the upper lip going. Quite a number of players have advocated a shift for the pedal register, and you may get better control and tone with the upper than the bottom lip is giving you.

I haven't played a Conn fiberglass horn since college, but I remember that pedal notes were fairly easy to hit on them but sounded thin. I sounded lousy on any fiberglass horn I've ever played, though.