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Missouri why have you dragged a masters student into what might have been an interesting thread?

Missouri wrote:Find a way to coat the rim with plastic

You just removed the one variable that is at all likely to affect anything out in front.

All I can tell you is that on a standard Conn 14K sousaphone, two band directors together attempting to discern any differences, with a combined experience of 60 to 70 years conducting, couldn't tell the difference between my Bach 18 and a Kelly 18 across the band room.

I understand the point of the fingernail polish or whatever, I'm just telling you, that removes the one practical difference between different materials. "Molecular vibrations" aren't a factor, but that doesn't mean one material is the same as another.

Saxophone players have been dealing with this for generations. There's a sort of folk believe that metal mouthpieces are "bright" and hard rubber etc. mouthpieces are "dark", and other attributes more or less in line with that, but despite the large number of people who believe it and the number of places it appears in print, it's easy to dispose of that crap with any sample of mouthpieces of your choice. The people in the next line of trenches concede that, but they still hold on to some vestigial version of it, like hard rubber is "more complex" or "warmer."

I recently heard a great sample series, where a guy who has a small potatoes mouthpiece line got the same design cut, via CNC, into a hard rubber mouthpiece and a metal mouthpiece. He then made audio recordings playing the same lick several times on both, put them online and invited people to guess which was which. I was initially skeptical because you know an online compressed audio recording is not going to be the highest fidelity medium, but he did a real good job recording them (and a real good job playing the same thing 7 times in a row), and you're getting a far closer look at the sound than you'd get in a typical ensemble performance. (Like the tuba, tenor saxophone isn't commonly used to play unaccompanied solo partitas etc.)

Needless to say, no one could pretend to have a clue which was which. There is essentially no difference. Because? Because unlike a string instrument like the violin or guitar, wind instruments form sound by resonating inside a long cavity. The attributes of the body that matter are the shape of the cavity and to some degree perhaps the acoustic reflective qualities of the inner surface. (Saxophone people believe the surface of the pads matters, so they tend to mostly cover them with big resonator buttons that are supposed to reflect better. That kind of thing doesn't occur in tuba design that I've heard of, but note that 1) the rest of the pad surface is leather, and tubas don't have leather inside them, and 2) the pads in a conventional saxophone are at the top of a short column at right angles to the bore, and a tuba bore is typically free of all those little dead ends.)

Missouri wrote: With this theory, assuming what's inside the tuba stays the same, if we had 5 identical shaped mouthpieces with the same rims,one regular, one gold plated, one stainless, one plastic, and one titanium, they should all sound the same, produce the same volume and overtones.

If you cover the rims with plastic or fingernail polish, yes. Would this make the mouthpiece makers' sales pitches invalid? (Hint: do they sell the mouthpieces with the rims covered with plastic?) If this seems implausible, consider that many players find that gold plating plays different enough to be worth it. It's literally superficial, the tiny amount of gold affects only surface characteristics. Why would that matter?

I can only assume you meant to refer to me... Spell it right, guys! C'mon!

I primarily play on stainless steel. I prefer how it feels, and like having options with the component configurations Houser and Bloke offer. That being said, mouthpiece factors intrigue me, as do mouthpiece/horn pairings. It seems to me so far that the material matters a lot less than the shape factors, but I'd like to see some direct comparisons done. Heck, maybe I'll be the one to do it. Who wants to donate a pile of mouthpieces? I've learned not to ask to borrow them!

But for now, I'm just gonna go ahead and finish up with what I've got going on here. Plenty to do, including a recital in a couple weeks. Perhaps in the future.

goodgigs wrote:

Donn wrote:consider that many players find that gold plating plays different enough to be worth it.
...

Comfort !

No, that's not it. Sure, if it feels good, that's a reason. If you're allergic to silver, that's a reason. If you like the looks, that's a reason. If your favorite player plays a gold plated mouthpiece, that's a reason. There are many fine reasons to buy a gold plated mouthpiece, that have nothing to do with the question. There have been more than a few reports from people who think it gives them audibly different results. I don't know if it does, I'm just saying it's plausible.

bloke wrote:I like stainless steel for one reason:

Once the surface of the rim is polished to a mirror finish, (unlike softer metals) it stays that way for a very long time - and with far less "babying" than with softer metals. Even beard stubble, seemingly, can scuff a gold plated mouthpiece.

That, too. When I started down the road of stainless steel mouthpieces, I had realized the Bach Megatone 7 that Mike Thornton gave me to play wasn't doing it for me, and that I was wearing the silver plating off of it. Even if the finish of a stainless piece is gone, so what? It'll feel different, but it doesn't change the material you're putting on your face all day. I also find stainless easier to keep clean, even with just a wipe-down.

I have seen a comment posted to the effect that a plastic Kelly was more controllable at high dynamics with golfer's lead tape wrapped around the throat, which adds mass and damping, and so presumably reduces the vibrations fed back to the player. This suggests a mechanism by which the material of which the mouthpiece is made could change the sound, if fed-back vibrations interfere with the player's embouchure: different materials would transmit/damp vibration to different extents (but the effect is probably not very marked). Some players would presumably be more/less vulnerable than others.

Speculation, of course. Proof one way or the other would be welcome.

Also I have seen claims that gold-plated mouthpieces are soft enough to pick up micro-scratches, so the surface holds moisture, which lubricates it. The result is that lips are free to vibrate, even though they are in contact with the rim, so the gold-plated rim feels bigger; this affects your upper register, but not your dynamics (the rim feels wider, but the cup volume is not changed). If you varnish over the gold (for your blind test), this effect is lost, and there's not enough gold there to have any other effect.

My own experience tends to support this; I am currently playing a ratty old mouthpiece that has lost most of its gold plate, and needs a coat of varnish to keep the Nickel undercoat off my face. For what it's worth, the mouthpiece in its current state feels smaller than I remember it being when it was new twenty-some years ago, so I tend to accept the claims described above. On the other hand, I was also a lot newer myself twenty years ago, and memory can be fickle.

MikeW wrote:I have seen a comment posted to the effect that a plastic Kelly was more controllable at high dynamics with golfer's lead tape wrapped around the throat, which adds mass and damping, and so presumably reduces the vibrations fed back to the player. This suggests a mechanism by which the material of which the mouthpiece is made could change the sound, if fed-back vibrations interfere with the player's embouchure: different materials would transmit/damp vibration to different extents (but the effect is probably not very marked). Some players would presumably be more/less vulnerable than others.

Yes, I've wondered about that too. Especially since a Kelly mouthpiece is typically situated on the end of a wobbly assembly of sousaphone bits. I reckon you could get even more improvements by wrapping that mess with lead.

Also, somewhat tangentially, wanted to note that many respectable observers find a significant difference from materials used in for example trombone bells. Enough that while I reserve the right to be skeptical, it's hard to be sure there's nothing to it - maybe out in the bell flare region, body vibration really plays enough of a role to be audible.

pokerface

http://www.golfsmith.com/product/300402 ... d-tape-1/2

A word of caution if there is Pb in this lead tape then I would not advocate using on a mouthpiece.
In my work I have to handle lead shielding both plain and encased in vinyl and I must wear gloves and not eat after handling without washing first.

MikeW wrote:I have seen a comment posted to the effect that a plastic Kelly was more controllable at high dynamics with golfer's lead tape wrapped around the throat.

That would be me. And that was done for the band directors I played for that I commented on in my post above.

Personal comfort, feel, and preference are legitimate reasons to choose a particular material or materials (base, plating, etc.) for a mouthpiece. Another one is sensitivity or allergy to substances. My son is sensitive to nickel, for example. He likes the feel of a gold plated mouthpiece, but is not reactionary to his silver plated cornet mouthpiece.