Unknown F on Ebay

[Davy]

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Used-tuba-in-F/173708339645?_mwBanner=1&ul_ref=https%3A%2F%2Frover.ebay.com%2Frover%2F0%2F0%2F0%3Fmpre%3Dhttps%253A%252F%252Fwww.ebay.com%252Fulk%252Fitm%252F173708339645%26rvr_id%3D0%26rvr_ts%3Df2058fc01670a9c40c742015ffdc97aa&ul_noapp=true&pageci=ae93a389-1d69-4cda-8123-14f1e70a2f25

Any possible ID’s on this?

[MikeMason]

Valves remind me of b&m.

[kingconn]

Pretty sure it's a Kalison, DS. Smallish F but nice.

[bort]

http://www.kalison.at/f-tuba/f-tuba_001.php

[Donn]

Huh. I sort of lusted after that cute little Italian number, back in the day. Faded glories. I guess that was almost 30 years ago. I wonder if it really is unbranded, or just a combination of heavy tarnish and not looking very hard.

[MikeMason]

I would consider buying this,but would need it shipped to Alabama. Any tubenetters in Madison who might help a brother out?

[the elephant]

Kalison F

Good players, in the same size class of the MW-182 and the YFB-621, has a nice tone, more colorful than the Yamaha but still sort of vanilla compared to the Melton. (I have owned all three horns over the years.)

The 23 overtone series is challenging, and the low B and Bb are a little squirrelly. The low Bb reminds me of the same note on the larger Yamaha F, not wanting to match in color to the ones around it, but working pretty well. The low B is sharp played 24 and flat played 235 and adjusting either is not thrilling since they both need more than a little correction. The low C is fine, with a tone that matches everything else around it and a nice, centered, focused feel that matches the rest of the horn.

These are very good at large ensemble projection, far easier to play in an 80 piece symphony than the Yamaha, which is okay, but requires some serious physical work to get out, sometimes. The MW also projects very well, but the Kalison projects its voice better in the low range.

I liked mine but sold it because all the 23 notes needed serious work out of proportion to how easily everything else worked.

For me.

On my horn.

YMMV.

I would own one again if the price were right, but I have a MW 182 bugle sitting here begging for a new valve section, and my regular F is a 6/4 horn, so I will not be looking at this Kalison F tuba at all. Go nuts. You likely will not be disappointed. Note that the CC DS had a detachable valve section that made polishing and cleaning (and access for fixing some damage) VERY EASY. I do. not remember my Kalison F having this feature. It may have, I just cannot remember. Note that the Kalison detachable brace posts are THIN and you can seriously damage these horns if they are dropped, like in a very SERIOUS type of remove-the-valve-section-so-you-can-fix-all-the-piston-ports-that-were-tweaked-so-that-the-valves-no-longer-work damage. I am not kidding. My CC happened to be prototype #2 and it used a MUCH better piston set (B&M/Nirschl-made) than the later production tubas, and I think they upgraded the bracing at that time. I have never taken down a production DS so I have no comparative information to offer up. Suffice it to say that as well as prototype #2 played it was glass-like fragile. (Jake liked it a lot. He detested the original prototype, so that says *something* about that particular tuba.)

"Eh! 'FRA-GEE-LAY' It must be Italian!"

http://coub.com/view/1016ou