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From what I've heard, Warren Deck acquired a Yorkbrunner around the time of the CSO audition. He used it for a couple years in the Phil, but with a raw brass Meinl bell and some other modifications. I think he used it right before his own model (2165) came on the market. You can see a picture of the horn on David Finlayson's website:

http://www.davidfinlayson.com/

When I took a lesson with him in his basement, he had the horn down there. It was mostly stock except for the leadpipe. At the time he called it "the world's most expensive practice tuba."

Ben is correct in his recollection, and I can add some details.

I was studying with Warren at Juilliard at the time, and when he started looking for a replacement for his Conn Frankentuba he went to work on the Yorkbrunner. As I recall, he had originally purchased the Yorkbrunner from Don Little. He started playing it in the orchestra over the summer of 1990, and I first heard him play it with the low brass section of the Philharmonic in a master class in Dallas, TX. At that time it was mostly stock.

Over the next 9 months or so he changed the bell a couple of times, removed/added silver plating, moved the fifth valve, experimented with the weight of the valve caps, and tweaked various things to determine the effect. It seems that every week in my lesson something would be different, and it always made the horn sound better. In the summer of 1991 he got the first prototype of the 2165, and he started playing it in the orchestra in the fall of 1991.

Warren was a repairman at Giardinelli's before he won the tuba job in the Houston Symphony, and he could do just about anything he wanted to an instrument. He had a lathe and other metalworking equipment at his house, and was extremely creative and competent at his craft. It's interesting to me that Alan Baer also did repair work along the way - perhaps that is a prerequisite to playing tuba in the NY Phil!

I think Warren recorded Planets (Mehta), Mahler 5 (Mehta), Sibelius 2nd (Mehta) , Pines/Fountains/Feste (Sinopoli), and Pictures (?) on the Yorkbrunner. At that point, though, it was no longer a Yorkbrunner! Pretty much anything recorded during the 1990-1991 season would have been on this instrument.

Morris Kainuma and Eric Fritz were also both around at the time and would remember details.

For the record, Warren sounded great on everything he touched. He could make a garbage can sound amazing!

Rod

I remember this tuba VERY well. He did indeed play it the NYP with the 90-91 season being the last one. This was Rod's last year at Juilliard and my first. I too remember that besides talking about tuba playing and music in my lessons, instrument design, repair and overall "creative experimenting" ALWAYS found it's way into the class. I found this fascinating and learned alot about tubas. I remember my first trip to the MW factory (with Rod) how so much then made sense from my converstaions with Warren. I remember one class when he came in with heavy valves caps that he had made and wanted to try them on my Hirsbrunner HB-2p. It helped my tuba alot but there wasn't any real benefit when put on his tuba. The next week he came in and gave them to me. I put them on that day and played that tuba for the next 7 years with those valve caps. Gary Bird bought that tuba. Are they still on there Gary? Rod 's info about Warren being an expert repairman is correct. He spent 8 hours a day basically repairing trumpets at Giardinellis before getting the Houston job. Throught his day, he would play trumpet. 1, to see if his repairs had worked and 2, he thought that playing trumpet was better than playing nothing. Keep those lips vibrating! He would then go home, take a nap and then practice for 2 hours. He then won the Houston auditon. Think about that one! Mark Gould told me that Warren had one of the most beautiful piccolo trumpet sounds he had ever heard. Sorry to get off the point a llittle bit but Warren's story is truly interesting and motivating. And yes, he sounded great on all of the recordings that he used the Yorkbrunner on.

Eric Fritz
Principal Tubist, Orquesta Sinfónica de Xalapa

Matt Ranson in the Winston Salem Symphony owned the horn for a long time. I bought my hirsbrunner from him so he could buy Warrens Yorkbrunner. Matt sent the horn to Hirsbrunner to have the modifications done to it and to re-plate the silver. When it came back he sold it to Tim Byrum, it's current owner. I think this is what happened to that horn.

DP wrote:

PhilW. wrote:All this talk really makes me want to go study with him. Does anybody know what he's been up to lately?

Retired

From what I understand, Warren Deck teaches in some capacity at the University of Denver.

Tony's right. I owned that tuba for about 11 years. When it came back from Switzerland after its overhaul, it was a very different instrument.
I wasn't comfortable with it. It took me a few years to finally find another tuba after that one.

Matt