... for all his help during my visit to WWBW today
... for his extra effort to ensure the horns I was interested were available
... for his normal, insightful tips & pointers on my general playing
... for taking a few minutes to personally fix a problem with one of the horns I brought along
... for being a heck of a nice guy
... because the last time I did this, some negative comments that seemed (based on the poster's own accompanying details) to be unfounded took the thread off into the weeds.
So to try to prevent a recurrence, I'm not going to thank Roger for all his help today, and for the great selection of horns available to try out.
Oh, and BTW, when I walked in with two tubas and a mouthpiece roll, the professional gentlemen at the security booth really did want to take a look at the things I was bringing in, and also wanted to check them on the way back out. Strangest thing -- they didn't want any valuable merchandise "walking off" without being paid for. This is their standard procedure (fyi), and it seems quite appropriate to me. It did take me all of 60 seconds to comply -- not at all a major inconvenience.
Also BTW, I tried the following horns, and had the following impressions:
1. Willson Eb -- hoped to be a one-tuba solution, but was too much work from BBb down to pedal Eb for me.
2. MW 2040/5 -- very nice horn, large "F-ish" sound, easy to play everywhere, not "weighty" enough to be a one-tuba solution, valve cluster a little higher than most horns, so this one feels a little different. Other than that quirk, I quite liked this horn.
3. Brasswind's "Allora" 6/4 CC horn -- very easy to play and a large sound.
4. Miraphone 1291 and 1292 in CC -- 1292 was a dream to play with a nice, large 4/4-ish sound. (I think they consider it a compact 5/4 -- whatever.) This would be an ideal do-it-all tuba, in my book.
5. THOR -- WOW!!! The weight of the sound of this horn in the low to mid registers is amazing -- absolutely amazing. I found the 1292 to be easier to find (precisely "nail") the notes in the upper register -- the Thor for me took a bit more work. But the weight of the sound in the medium to low register might make it worthwhile to work a bit more on the upper register. With very little effort, you (well -- a hack like me) can get a very big sound with this horn. Too heavy for a quintet, IMO, unless the other 4 players are pros.
My favorite today was the Miraphone 1292 in the CC category, as far as being the first CC I'd shell out money to buy with no further thought or hand-wringing (brain-wringing). But the Thor was the one tuba with a sound that made me immediately say, "I want one!"
6. But I also played the new Firebird F. As I have posted before, "I've never met a rotary F tuba with an easy to play low C. Hence, I've about given up all hope that such a horn exists." Today, my disillusionment was dashed. I consider myself to be a very picky tuba player, having the strange notion that if I pay thousands of dollars for an instrument, I shouldn't have to fight with it for either intonation or playability. Today, I found the Firebird to be a workable rotary F tuba. I can't call the low C "perfect", but this is the first rotary F tuba I've played with a low C that I felt was so good as to take only a passing amount of extra care when playing the note. Unlike other rotary F tubas, if you push the low C, it WILL still play -- gentle finesse is not required to play this note. Again -- not as good as my previous 621F, but it plays so well that I believe an ethical tuba salesman could properly say "the low C is good on this tuba". The Firebird is not nearly as weighty in sound as the Yamaha 822F Roger played for me as a comparison point (as you'd expect). So it's not a "do it all" F tuba. But as a "true, 4/4 bass tuba" it was quite good.
Cheers,
