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I've just spent the morning with a group of BBb players, including brass band legends Derek Jackson and Simon Greswell, trying and testing the new Yamaha Neo BBb bass. It's been developed by Yamaha over the last 4.5 years with Simon Greswell and Conductor and pedagogist David King, and we had Simon's prototype and a pre production model from Japan.

It's nothing like the current Besson/Boosey/York clones, and I think it will knock the socks off them when it comes to market. It's actually comfortable to hold, and has a far more solid core to the sound throughout the range and at all volumes. It doesn't drain the air from you either, something that the current British BBb does. Tuning is far better than the current brands at first play, but I will hopefully get one to try in ensembles pretty soon.

Yamaha were very thorough. We had David King, Simon Greswell, 2 Yamaha experts and low brass specialist Kim Lofthouse with us, and they listened to every player (6 of us) intently on both instruments, took feedback from us and measured leadpipe heights, how tall we were, our current instruments and mouthpieces, what we thought on all aspects and noted everything down.

I'll post more when I know more, or if anyone wants to know anything post or pm!

They're "quietly" (their words, not mine!) developing a new Baritone (with Katrina Marzella) and Euphonium (with Steven Walsh and others) as well, to add to the Xeno cornet and Neo tenor horn.

When still able to play, I spent extensive time with both a B&H 3 valve BBb compensating instrument, which along with the Conn 14K sousaphone I rank as the best tubas of any make or key I have ever played, the original Yamaha 4 valve compensator, which I thought was the poorest example of any instrument I ever played due to its faulty intonation and ergonomic issues, and a B&H traditional 4 valve compensator that was incredibly hard to deal with in terms of ergonomics and was VERY mouthpiece sensitive for me, I applaud Yamaha for delving into an instrument market that is crying for a truly top-notch instrument. With the burgeoning brass band movement world wide, particularly in the States, Yamaha should be able to recoup its investment if the horn is as good as you say. This is a great day for BBb players EVERYWHERE. Keep us posted on the the progress. I will be interested to see the opinions of the first batch that goes on sale to the market at large.

Chuck

http://www.facebook.com/posted.php?id=1 ... 3119048146

Quick google search lead me to these pics.

Wim

Neat placement of the 4th valve.

"The Godfather" - Derek Jackson.

I'm on a few of the photos linked above. 4th valve is VERY comfortable! They've also lowered the valve block, so it's less reach overall, both to the 4th valve, but also the normal holding position.

Any more word on these...?

Love to know when/where I could try one out!

They should be available in the next couple of months apparently.

What is the quality of the metal like? Our impression of Yamaha brass in the past is that it is not terribly robust and therefore easily prone to damage.

LJV wrote:

peter birch wrote:What is the quality of the metal like? Our impression of Yamaha brass in the past is that it is not terribly robust and therefore easily prone to damage.

I had British-made Besson 983 and 980 Eb tubas. All I had to do was look at them wrong and they'd dent. Couldn't be worse than that.

Yeah, I know, start waiving the Union Jack and hit me with the flag pole...

we felt the same about them too, when we went from the Imperials, that were built like tanks, and weighed about the same as a tank, to the Sovereigns, but the Yamaha's still appeared to be lighter and even more prone to dentation

LJV wrote:Yeah, I know, start waiving the Union Jack and hit me with the flag pole...

Best defense: Sing the second strain of National Emblem.

K

imperialbari wrote:

LJV wrote:Yeah, I know, start waiving the Union Jack and hit me with the flag pole...

Best defense: Sing the second strain of National Emblem.

K

same tune to different words

From the Cory Band's Facebook page, here is a photo of Katrina Marzella (right) with what looks like it could be a prototype of the Neo baritone. Thanks to bbocaner on Dave Werden's Euphonium board for catching this.

Yes it is a Neo prototype. The Euph is coming out soon as well, hope you can see the picture below, it's from Steve Walsh (Brighouse) Facebook!

http://youtu.be/ZT6_vWtKryE

Video from Frankfurt with the new Neo Euph and BBb.

Excellent... exciting times. I see they're going with a model number YBB-632.

Looking forward to them making it out to Australia... or perhaps me relocating to the UK.

I never thought the 'metal issue' had anything to do with dents. It seemed to me to be an argument over the sound the Yamaha brass produced.

Yamaha's certainly sounded different than Besson/B&H instruments but whether it was bad or good, appropriate or inappropriate seemed to be a matter of taste.

Both companies have had their share of instrumental duds and stars.