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Is it possible, and is it inthe future that our major commercial tuba manufacturers will sucessfully design and produce a modern, viable, EE flat, large bore, BAT, contrabass, tuba. Besson 983, Wilson, and Norweigian Star are slightly approaching that goal. After-all the "majority" of the first valved tubas in the 1840's and 1850's were E flat. Can a good EE flat contrabass be made???????????

Could it possibly be the reason there is no market for them is there has never been a sucessful one made??????----yet

Sure, and pigs don't fly - yet!

Best bet is probably to get your hands on an old one and have it rebuilt. I just don't think there's a big market for a lot of new R&D. Seems like Meinl Weston and B&S are making some pretty large F tubas now... maybe that can serve a similar purpose?

Isn’t this thread an attempt of making a brown mule on TubeNet’ters?

Well if the goal was just for a large bore, BA-Eb-T, then I'd recommend playing around on an Eb sousaphone for a while. There are some very good examples out there that play basically like 6/4 horns that have been re-wrapped...now as far as finding one that is well in tune, has the proper number of valves for your particular playing, etc...well, now that is a different story.

Just out of curiosity, when you say contrabass do you mean that you want an Eb tuba pitched an octave bellow the standard Eb tuba? If so then I'd say that we can keep dreaming. I'd love to play such a monster, but I doubt that they will ever be commercially produced.

Actually, the first Weiprecht-Moritz tubas were in F.

It was the Saxhorns that were in Eb bass, as well as Bb bass (similar to a modern euphonium).

Are you talking about a 6/4 Eb tuba in the pitch common now, or are you talking about a whopper of a horn pitched below a BBb contrabass? It seems as if you mean the former, but there are some mixed messages here.

Google zeroed right in on the old threads. The topic has shown up several times before on the old board, particularly around 2004 and 2005. To some, Eb refers to an 3-valve bass, while EEb refers to a 4-valve. Some use it to refer to bore or throat size still in the same pitch. Some use it to refer to a monster an octave below the Eb bass, while some refer to that instrument as an EEEb. It's just more confusion because of inconsistent nomenclature.

While the MW 2141 Eb isn't a 6/4 BAT, it's a 5/4 BAT. It has a solid low register and a wonderful upper register. I'd recommend this tuba for someone who's looking for a large Eb. It works great for quintet, quartet, and solo work.

What would be the point of an EEb Contra? Anything you could ever need to do can be accomplished on a good CC or BBb. I think that might be the major part of why they aren't production horns. The second issue would be overall cost of producing one.

I see plenty of fairly large E flat tubas being produced these days. I honestly have no clue what the original poster is complaining about.

Brown Mule wrote:Besson 983, Wilson, and Norweigian Star are slightly approaching that goal.

From this statement I conclude the original poster is referring to a large Eb bass tuba, rather than contrabass tuba - he is using the British use of EEb tuba to mean large 4 valve Eb.

If that is what you want then the British 3+1 models, such as the Besson 981, or 982 are just what you are looking. Some British tubists use them as contrabass tubas to play everything including such as Prokofiev and Wagner Ring. No reason why the OP should not also!

Neptune wrote:

Brown Mule wrote:Besson 983, Wilson, and Norweigian Star are slightly approaching that goal.

From this statement I conclude the original poster is referring to a large Eb bass tuba, rather than contrabass tuba - he is using the British use of EEb tuba to mean large 4 valve Eb.

If that is what you want then the British 3+1 models, such as the Besson 981, or 982 are just what you are looking. Some British tubists use them as contrabass tubas to play everything including such as Prokofiev and Wagner Ring. No reason why the OP should not also!

you can hear a great British tuba player doing just that with just such a tuba

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyViqSdAbJo&hd=1

The original poster is simply implying that with the newer designed e flats , you can do about anything with any music put infront of you. There has been tremendous improvement in these horns. In 68 years of playing I found years ago you were very limited with a little small bore 3 valve e flat.( I play e flat and BB flat ) Now I notice the guys with the besson 983's can keep right up with the BB flats and CC's. I have tried these horns and can hit a good solid low B flat as easy as on a b flat. I think, and wondered if others do too ,that massive strides have been made with E's and f's in recent years. Just wondered if further improvement might be in the future to make them a sucessful and acceptable big band or Orchestra horn. Not trying to make the thread complex and as someone said maybe no one would want the e flat with CC's and BB's available. As Tuba players, we are more fortunate than most in that we have a choice of 4 keys when purchasing a horn.

The Willson 3400 is already just about as big as a 4/4 contrabass. And in England, many orchestral players use 981's (or is it 982's), even for the big stuff.

But I think that despite the versatility of these instruments, they still do not do what a grand orchestral contrabass tuba can do. And I doubt it would be possible to build an Eb or F bugle with the sort of bottom bow and bell stack of a BAT and still have a remotely usable scale. It's hard enough to do with a C compared to a Bb.

Looking at it from a different perspective, you are asking if there is a trend towards using a single, versatile instrument instead of large-ensemble tuba players owning several instruments. In my opinion, no. The trend of the last several decades has been in the opposite direction. European and even British tuba players are now following American practice into owning a stable of more specialized instruments to be called on for specific works. The reason is that even though one may play, say, Berlioz on a large contrabass, it doesn't have the timbre appropriate for it. A highly versatile instrument, no matter what its pitch, might be acceptable for Berlioz, but most tuba players these days can do better. And what does better for Berlioz will be a struggle with, say, Prokofiev. Most players these days can afford to have several instruments, so they don't have to make such compromises.

Rick "trends almost always lead to specialization" Denney

Rick ,this has been exactly my "train of thought" on said subject over past few years. No matter how much improvement has been made over the years, there is a" nitch" for each of the 4 keys.