Impromptu visit to Blokeplace

[Billy M.]

During my vacation in Nashville last week, I decided to make a call to Bloke to see if I could come by and check out his PT-10-like F tuba. It's a bit of a drive from Nashville to Blokeplace, but it's a nice one and plus I live over 400 miles away otherwise and I'm on vacation. So why not, right?

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Sure enough his house was open to take my visit.

While on the phone he told me he actually had one of the new JP piston F tubas for trying out as well. Excellent, I thought, a chance to try out both.

When I got there, Bloke and Debbie invited me in and we exchanged pleasantries. Now, you guys may think Bloke may rib ya here and there on the board, but he AND his wife are good people. They offered to feed me since I'd come straight from Nashville and it was around lunch time. I politely declined as I was looking to play some tubas and talk a bit, plus I had a 400+ mile drive to head home with about 200 already in the books for the day.

First up, Bloke's F frankentuba: This is a very nice F tuba that plays like an F tuba. It's even, plays well, and seems to be very in-tune with itself. Bloke's description is right: you CANNOT play it like a C tuba, it's not. If you try to play it this way, you will not like it. If you play it like an F, it's wonderful. Bloke's price is definitely fair for this horn and you will be hard pressed to find something better for the price.

Up next was the JP piston F tuba. I personally liked the way this horn played... because it plays like an Eb and that's what I use for my bass tuba playing. The sound is big yet nimble and very pleasing and the build is quite solid. I'd switch for lighter springs on it as the ones it comes with are rather hard. However, this horn will require slide-pulling that the Blokehorn does not.

I am not really in the market for a new horn at this time and being that I'm happy with my Eb tubas, going to F is not in the cards. But, whoever ends up purchasing these horns should be very happy.

If you're looking for an F tuba, you should really give Bloke (Joe) a call, he doesn't bite, and like I said, he's good people.