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Both horns are good. Harv is a really honest man and does good work. If you play gypsy music perhaps a better and more economical choice is this helicon:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Silver-Conn-BBb-Sil ... nstruments" target="_blank" target="_blank

What are the valves that are on that helicon? They are short action, but are clearly not 20K valves.

Reynolds was a much smaller volume manufacturer than King and they were known for making good quality instruments. They didn't make very many tubas, and made even fewer sousaphones. I like King sousaphones (at least the older ones) but I think that Reynolds would also be a good choice. It certainly striking looking with the silver and gold, and while lots of people will have Kings, you won't run into very many of these so it wins on the unique factor. Also, the Reynolds has a smaller bell, which I find to reduce some of the annoying after ring that you can get with some sousaphones.

King Sousas and Reynolds Sousas are both good horns. You would probably be happy with either horn. You might try to find a shop in your area that has a few Sousas and try a few different models out.

Harv really does beautiful work.

But if I had to choose one I would go with the King. I have played quite a few King and Reynolds Sousas. In my opinion both brands are good, but I have had a better experience overall with King Sousas.

Good luck in your search!

I'm sure that's a fine sousaphone - Reynolds made pretty good stuff, and this one comes from the shop of someone who reportedly knows what he's doing.

I believe I had a Reynolds sousaphone for a while back in the '80s, and ... uh ... I don't remember anything bad about it. But I soon replaced my Reynolds with another, "better", sousaphone, which over the years has turned out to be "a sousaphone". The upgrade didn't really change my life.

I'm going to sub on tuba for next week's practice, in a Balkan brass band, playing that Conn sousaphone. The regular tuba player also has a Conn, 20K. We don't sound like each other.

My recommendation would be "don't do it." Unless there's more to the story, like your 14K is irreparably trashed and unplayable. Even if it's irreparably trashed and marginally playable, that gives you time to look for a replacement you can play first. But more likely, if it's really not that bad, I suspect your 14K will serve your purposes fine with a little more development on your part, including maybe some experimentation with mouthpieces. Take this with a grain of salt, because I'm really more of a saxophone player, but I use a fairly shallow mouthpiece for this stuff. Specifically a Marcinkiewicz H4, but heaven knows if that's the right thing for you, I'm just saying a well chosen mouthpiece might be a much cheaper and more effective way to improve your setup, depending on what you use now.

I like helicons, but sousaphones have a couple of advantages - tall, optimally directional, and between gigs the bell can be detached for more compact travelling. Also they tend to be more available and cheaper for what you get. A lot of the helicons in Romanian/Macedonian/etc bands are Eb or F ... that's another thing you might think about, if your band doesn't really need a contrabass.

Timswisstuba wrote:Both horns are good. Harv is a really honest man and does good work. If you play gypsy music perhaps a better and more economical choice is this helicon:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Silver-Conn-BBb-Sil ... nstruments" target="_blank" target="_blank" target="_blank

Word.

Let's put it this way: when H. N. White went into business making trombones for Thomas King, he hired Reynolds away from York to develop the valved brass. Later, when White wanted Reynolds to head up marketing, he went out on his own, then retired and sold the company, then came back as a partner to Olds.

Yes, Reynolds, especially the Contempora series of instruments, are fine instruments. Now you know why they are so similar (underslung King Master and Reynolds Contempora cornets; and almost identical souzy valvesets, for example.)