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i was wondering if you played a school tuba what was condition of the horn. i live in a little town in British Columbia i go to a middle/high school we have 3 tubas, we have a 3 piston valve 3/4 size BBb amati kraslice tuba which has more than a couple dent do to a loose mouthpiece in the case also the brass is very thin and i guess that does not help. we have a 4 rotary valve BBb tuba exchange model 2110l tuba with one dent on the fourth valve tubing otherwise its pretty much new i also play this horn . we also have a 3 piston valve 1930's BBb silver salvation army triumphonic tuba at least we think its from the 1930's.

Back in the late '70s, we had a Besson 3v compensator, a Conn 20J, and a 1967 BBb Miraphone 186. All had been around awhile, but were well maintained, had no major dents, and played well. During my 4 years, I played 'em all. My favorite was the 186. I wish I still played it, as it was a great horn. I think it may still be in use at the school. Good times.

I played a King sousaphone, somewhat dented, but a good sounding horn.

We had two BBbs, an Olds O-99 and the Reynolds model that was nearly identical. Both were 3-valvers but very nice and included a top slide for the first valve. Both came with cases made of a rigid styrofoam-whatever happened to that idea? They were surprisingly durable and as lightweight as could be imagined.

For F-S-J years, I played a (it was old even then) 1st generation King fiberglass sousaphone that was what the school had for both marching and concert band. It was "my" horn. I was expected to take care of it as if I bought it, because if I didn't, then I would have had to buy it. The early fiberglass was more substantial than the thin resin used now, and it sounded great. I cleaned and worked on that horn until it was as white as I could make it. (Our school colors were blue & white, hence the fiberglass instead of brass) On those King souzys, we got more "1" ratings at state contest than any other high school band at the time per year for everything from small ensembles, to brass choirs (including Gabrielli multiple choir selections in the large regional university gymnasium that the acoustics actually helped emulate the long reverb at St. Marks), to full concert band, including sight reading in concert.

Senior year, we finally got King 2341's for concert band. Four of them! Magnificent tubas! And Wenger tuba stands to help those of lesser stature maintain good posture, technique and pedagogy. There is much bandwidth on this forum extolling the virtues of a King 2341 for an advanced high school band, so I'll just leave it there.

Unfortunately, generations have come and gone. The Kings are no more, replaced by Yamaha 321's. (Sigh....)

Actually, the condition of the school tubas/sousaphones I played was quite good, but I'm old school. For the most part, students(at least in my little world) took pretty good care of the instruments.

By the way, I played Conn sousaphones up through high school, then a 4 valve Besson tuba to begin college. In my second year of college, the university purchased a brand new 4 valve CC 186. I managed to eventually get to be the one to use it exclusively. That was the impetus for my learning to play CC tuba. I didn't own my own tuba until I finished my first year as a school band director, when I purchased a 5 valve CC 186, which I still own today. It cost me a little over 3 months of that first year salary.

What is FSJ?

My high school was in a blue collar neighborhood. The band was about 40 people. They did have several tubas, most of which were in need of repairs. They were not destroyed, and actually, kids took good care of what they already had. It was just a matter of having almost no repair budget except for the worst of the worst stuff. At some point, you reach the limit of "do more with less," and have to actually fix things.

Yamaha 201 -- fine, except it needed valve guides. In 2 years, I never got them. I did get very good at pushing the valve directly up and down.
Olds 99 -- the 1st valve stem was broken at the top of the valve. The tuba played okay otherwise, so I had to get really good at holding the valve stem in place while using (ugh, and not using) the valve.
Yamaha 3/4 convertible tuba -- mangled leadpipe, the removeable part was stuck and someone tried too hard to twist.

When I got to college and got to play a "real" tuba (a PT-3), it was a shock not only because it was in CC (which took a week or two), but because it was mechanically sound and easy to play. It was like I had been driving a car with the emergency brake and suddenly released it.

Looking back, those were some relatively inexpensive fixes. Lesson learned, no child of mine is going to play a broken-*** tuba, that's for sure.

bort wrote:What is FSJ?

Sorry - I thought it was obvious - freshman, sophomore, junior.

My son just finished middle school at the end of 8th grade. The middle school has two Jupiter 378 tubas, which get lent out for student to take home for practice. These are 3-valve 3/4 size instruments. They are both in decent shape, some small cosmetic dents here and there, a little bit of creasing of the bell on one of them, but they function fine (no leaks, valves move well, all slides are operable). These are not the greatest tubas around (they don't sound great), but they are convenient for home practice. For playing at school, we have two Yamaha 321 class instruments (soon to be three). These are full-size 4-valve tubas. One is barely two months old (a Holton stencil of the Yamaha), the other is about 10 years old and has cosmetic dents. Again, both play fine.

All these instruments get repaired reasonably well. Cosmetic dents are ignored, but stuck valves or slides get fixed by a technician that comes by once or twice a year. I'd expect them to live 10 to 20 years, then have to be replaced.

At the high school my son is about to enter, they have a mix of Miraphone 186 and Meinl-Weston 25 tubas (full-size 4 rotary valves) for use at school, and a whole slew of nearly new Conn 20 sousaphones for marching band. All these stay at school; the sousaphones are in great shape (shiny, no dents), because they are only a year old and are handled with great care. One sousaphone fell and had to have the bell replaced; clearly for a marching band the looks of the instruments is very important (cynics might even say that the looks are the only important thing, since the sound of a school marching band isn't all that great anyhow, but that would be a cruel exaggeration). Some of the 4-rotary concert tubas look a bit beat up, they are probably pretty old, but they all function well.

There are also a some older shoulder and convertible tubas that used to be used in marching band before they switched to sousaphones. If students need a loaner instrument for home, it comes from those older instruments (some of those are probably 3-valve and 3/4 size, and they are all pistons). It seems that at least the bulk of these instruments is functioning good, at least judging by the row of them stored in the band room ready for use.

I think during my brief experiment with school band, the school tuba may have been a sousaphone. I had a miserable clarinet. I don't know ... I could play some notes, maybe it wasn't that bad, but it wasn't in top shape.

We also had some academic subjects, including reading and writing. If I had opted for tuba in school and stuck with it, I might be a better player today, and if you stick with it, you may well turn out to be a better player than me. It still won't earn you a living. Some of the people who have contributed answers to this thread have made considerably more money at it than I have - to the extent that may have paid for their instruments. I bet a quarter we all have depended on other skills for our livelihoods.

Note the writing skills evident in every one of these replies. Punctuation, spelling, and more. I go to BC occasionally, and it's clear that Canada is an English speaking country, despite the French thing, so it's a great opportunity to learn to speak and write good English, as we learned to do. It will serve you well.

Jr. High - Conn 20J at school Conn 14K at home

HS - F/S years - Conn 20J at school Conn 36K at school for marching band Conn 20K at home.

Junior/Senior year - brand new Rudy Meinl at school (how great is that) Conn 36K at school for marching band and Conn 20J at home

It helped that the HS jazz band director was a professional jazz tuba player and the HS orchestra director was also a fine tubist and that the music program was one of the best in the nation with the band/music director (drummer) an ex-Navy premier bandsman and many students were sons/daughters of CSO and Lyric Opera musicians.

College - MW 25 and B&S F - not bad for a non-music major using school owned instruments.

I was fortunate to attend places where the instruments were taken care of over the years and that attitude was passed down and expected/demanded to be followed. My HS got over 40 years out of each of the three Rudy's it bought back in '70/'72/'74. Not a bad ROI. Of course if they had been trashed or used in a marginal music program it would have been a total waste of money. Every one of them did show up new in a wooden crate from Germany with a crease in the bell that had to be rolled out!

High school: I used a Miraphone 186 front-bell (some idiot had put Brasso on the lacquer the year before I used it, so most of the lacquer had peeled and the remainder was green), a really good Reynolds sousaphone, a solid Conn 20J, and the last couple of months of my senior year, a Conn 36K fiberglass flowerpot.

College 1st year: blah 36k marching, really excellent Miraphone 186 for concert.

Rest of college: mediocre Miraphone 186 (not a good example of the breed), finally bought my own horn, a Meinl-Weston 25 (was between that and Holton 345; I wish I knew then what I know now).

In middle school (only about half a year I started on tuba halfway through my 8th grade year) I used an Amati 3 valve that was more dent than not.

My high school had an interesting collection of horns, and for my first marching season I used a not very well cared for conn (?) fiberglass sousaphone which we had I think 4 of, that year we had 6 tubas in the band, and 3 of us were on sousas and the other three were on some 3/4 Olds and Dynasty convertibles which is what I ended up using during the concert season. We also had a quite old YBB 641 that sounded great but had completely shot valves (eventually someone made rings of duct tape for the paddles to put their fingers in so they could pull the valves back up with their fingers) a nice YBB 621 that for most of my high school time was the number 1 horn to use. my senior year we bought a brand new 5J though I never played it because by that time I had bought my first horn, a Cerveny 686 (which I only had two years before acquiring my York Master)

I used an older Conn bell front three valve my freshman year and Bes son four valve bell fronts after that. The were all in good shape and the Bessons were overhauled totally my senior year. I don't remember the sousaphones but they were fiberglass and got painted my jr year by the auto shop!!
ScottM

bloke wrote:I believe the most significant difference between "then" and "now" is "worn out" vs. "torn up".

From my experience, this is true more often than not.

Not quite a school tuba but my first tuba was a three valve B&H Eb Imperial that was in great condition quick valves lovely tone no big dents lacquer not so good that belonged to the Irish Transport and General Workers Union Band. It had a big wooden homemade wooden coffin case that bus drivers hated.
I still remember it fondly despite it only having 3 valves it was the first tuba I marched with and it got me into the National Youth Orchestra. Played it with a DW 5 and then a DW 3 I would buy it now if I knew where it was.
Schools in Ireland with concert bands are few and far between I can only think of two from personal knowledge and one of them was a reformatory school.

I played a little three-valved King 1140 for concert and marching band. It had a removable leadpipe that could be added to make it a poor resemblance of a contra. It was always fun to show up at All-State auditions with that little horn when everyone else had four-vavled German horns.

Until 1973, in HS, I played a 50plus year old King 1240 - or whatever its predecessor was designated - with fixed recording bell, hopelessly frozen slides and absolutely ZERO compression. Then, as a senior, I was recruited to play in the band at Northern Kentucky Community College (later Northern Kentucky U) and got to play, first, their Conn 20J and then their new 186. I was like Emo Phillips getting past the cellar door.

We had fiberglass Conn sousas for marching and concerts. Then in senior year they let me use a MW 25 which was brand new. That horn was great fun and I loved playing it. When I graduated, it was in perfect shape. The next guy had a bad case of dropsy and and "I don't care". It was in bad shape after that. Yamaha horns started showing up after that.

We had old, reconditioned Conn 14K sousaphones for marching band. The reconditioning work wasn't done very well though. Even the newly reconditioned ones fell apart constantly. We had Yamaha YBB-321 tubas for concert band. Never cared much for those. After I started playing in a local brass band I started taking the Besson Eb from there to school and used it instead. My senior year a new high school opened in my district and my director asked me what kind of tubas I I thought they should get for the new school. I asked for King 2341 tubas, but he ordered Yamahas instead. Don't even really know why he asked.....