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I had one tuba one mouthpiece for about 25 years then I bought a sousaphone for marching band up until that purchase I used a DW 3 with my tuba and a Besson 24 with the sousa . I now have 11 mouthpieces and 4 tubas. My preference is still for Dennis Wick and will probably stick with them while cheating on the side with cheap eBay acquisitions

I had about a 5-year stretch where I changed mouthpieces once a year trying to figure out what I liked and what worked best for me and my horn and give an honest effort on each mouthpiece. Around the third year it finally dawned on me to identify the characteristics of my current inventory of mouthpieces to identify narrow my search. Struck gold about a year ago with a mouthpiece that helps me achieve the sound that I want and can control.

When I switched over to a large bore euph from an itsy-bitsy student model horn, I freaked out. I didn't know what to do with all the air the bigger horn took, and my usual mouthpiece just didn't fit me. For a while, I played on a huge piece (Denis Wick 2AL) only because it was the only large-shank piece I owned. After a while, though, I started to recognize the disadvantages to playing on such a large piece. And so, I started on the Great Mouthpiece Hunt; the Quest for the Perfect Piece. $600, and 6 or 7 mouthpieces later, I settled on a GW titanium piece. Not because it was perfect, because I have yet to find a perfect piece (I doubt it even exists), but because it forced me to develop as a player. I think I may change up in the near future, but only when I find something that really kicks me in the crotch in the places where I could improve, and that retains my strengths in all my good areas. I feel like settling may promote stagnation. That said, all the switching around during my questing really messed with my embouchure for a while. It also really helped out with my sound concept and understanding of mouthpiece\ horn physics.

So, in summation, I use mouthpieces as conduits to the horn that force me to develop my playing in order to meet the standard I hold myself to, and then to further that standard and strive towards greater mastery of my instrument. But, I do it one step at a time, and I stick with a mouthpiece for a few years before switching off.

Grooving for Heaven wrote:Some people here change horns as often as they change underwear.

I'd swear some do so MORE often.

I thought I had found a lifetime mouthpiece about eight years ago in a Helleberg that seemed to be just right in all but one of my horns. (I was using a Bach Megatone 12 in the other horn.) I just bought a PT50 and, although the jury is still out, it has great potential!

P.S. Underwear changed daily, if not more often...just in case you were wondering.

I have been somewhat tempted to take as a model for my life a man who passed on a few years ago, leaving a collection of mouthpieces that swamped ebay. I'm not really a collector, though, and after a dozen or so tuba mouthpieces I have temporarily run out of compelling reasons to shell out for more. I find interesting differences between them, but not really critical differences.

Mouthpieces are critical for me on bass trombone though, probably because the smaller size embouchure runs into trouble with my snaggle teeth. Now I have a mouthpiece that works, but until I stumbled onto that it was looking pretty grim. So it does make sense to me to shop around a little and not just stick with whatever was on the shelf at the music store when you started playing.

I'm 29 and I've been playing tuba since 7th grade. In middle and high school, I just used the mouthpiece that the school gave me (I didn't know any better). I think I started on a Yamaha something and in HS, it was always a Marcinkewicz N4 (T. Johnson). Then I bought my own Marc N4 and played it with a Conn 2J I bought. I actually never experimented with different mouthpieces until college. A buddy let me borrowed a Schilke HBII and it sounded great on my horn. The Marc N4, in comparison, sounded so bright. Since then, I've collected my share of Hellebergs and other similar cups.

Around 2011, I finally figured out that I wanted 3 mouthpieces in one. The deep, colorful, and sometimes edgy sound of a Geib cup (like a Dillon M1C), the rim of a HBII, and the feel/durability of stainless steel (like a Loud mp). Thanks to bloke and Houser mouthpieces, the blokepiece Symphony cup is very similar to a Geib, they had a HBII rim, and all in a stainless steel package. When I first played it, I knew it was my mp for life. The right sound and the perfect feel. I sold the rest of my pieces and I haven't craved another mp since.

There is no "normal" when it comes to mouthpieces. But Harvey Phillips did stick with a standard Conn mouthpiece for his entire playing career, and that wasn't too shabby.
My father used a Fred Geib on his BBb and a Martin on his Eb for his entire playing career. I settled on a Doug Elliott tuba mouthpiece about 20 years ago and do not expect to make any more changes. Bill Bell used whatever mouthpiece was handy and made them all sound great.

I've played the same used Bach 18 (with "Mac" carved on the outside of the bowl) since about 1996. I've played either the stock 3g or an SM3M (about 9 years old now) on my euph since I got it in 1995.

Funny, after all this time I thought I'd be at least decent.

tstryk wrote:Something just feels different - maybe it is just my imagination.

Rumor has it, there has been some variation in Bach mouthpieces over the years. That said, I'm sure some of the differences we feel in mouthpieces come from our imaginations, but musicians (unlike say engineers) are permitted to have imaginations.