and you thought tubas were expensive . . .

[jonesbrass]

. . . I had an eye-opening experience in a sound studio this afternoon. As I was laying some tracks, I got to talking with my brother who's a recording engineer. He was using 4 mics to record my F tuba stuff, and one of the mics in the room was worth ten thousand dollars!!! I don't feel too bad about how much my tubas cost now. I know our equipment seems expensive at times, but looking at that mic and the mixing board and all the other stuff in the studio made me feel like I've escaped rather cheaply!!

Maybe I can use this illustration the next time I need to convince my wife to let me purchase another horn . . .

[ken k]

we have it easy compared to string players. My friend recently spent $3000 on his new bass bow!

THAT'S JUST THE BOW!!!

i didn't have the guts to ask him how much he paid for his bass.

k

[Alex F]

At the Cincinati Bass Cellar:

Carlo Testore, 7/8th size, 1700s: $85,000

Pedrazzini, Giuseppe, 3/4 size, 1906: $52,500

Lloyd, Nick, new 3/4 size: $19,500

ca. $20K is about the floor for a "professional" level bass.

$3k is also about the floor for a "pro" bow. They can run over $100K - for the BOW.

[LoyalTubist]

Watch it, Bob... You may be eating your words.

[TubaRay]

Watch it, Bob... You may be eating your words.

That'll never happen. Bob doesn't eat his words. They'd be too hard to swallow.

[pwhitaker]

Many many years ago I was in a community band and had just bought a brand new Besson BBb for about $5K. I was telling one of the other tuba players about this when our bassoonist - a crusty old retired anaesthesiologist - interjected with "I could sell my bassoon right now and buy 4 tubas just like that one." I replied "What a great idea, Chester. Why don't you do that?" ... He had to laugh.

[Rick Denney]

Let's take this in a different direction.

Auto mechanics are expected to provide their own tools, even if they work as a wage slave in a shop. A relatively modest collection of pro-quality tools (i.e., Snap-On) for an auto mechanic would be pushing $20,000. I could spend ten grand easily just buying socket sets in 3/8 and 1/2" drive, SAE and metric, plus a relatively small pro-grade tool cart to house them. A complete set of hand wrenches and air tools would exceed the other $10K. And professional car mechanics think about the Craftsmen tools that people like me use the same way pro tuba players think about plastic sousaphones.

Rick "recognizing that many auto mechanics make more money than many tuba players" Denney

[LoyalTubist]

And for those of us who are ignorant around mechanical things, we think Sears Craftsman is the best. I worked my way through college in a Mercedes-Benz dealer body shop and the guys from Snap-On Tools would come in once every so often to sell their latest gadgets. Being the delivery driver/maintenance guy, I didn't need the tools. I was shocked when I heard how much a tiny drill bit cost.

Yowch!

[peter birch]

we have it easy compared to string players. My friend recently spent $3000 on his new bass bow!

THAT'S JUST THE BOW!!!

i didn't have the guts to ask him how much he paid for his bass.

k

my son has just started to play the double bass at school, and wanted to know how much one costs. when we got to POA instruments he asked what POA stood for...if you have to ask-you can't afford it!!!

[Rick Denney]

Rick,

Have you shopped at Walmart lately? You can be stocked up for under a grand. Should be good enough for a wage slave.

Ken F.

I'll expect a report from you at your next audition or recital where you played a BBb Lark, heh, heh.

Had you said Sears, I would have upgraded you to a BBb King. You could get away with it and it's completely appropriate in some playing situations, but it would not be the choice of most day-in-and-day-out professionals.

Rick "whose Craftsman Industrial tools are adequate, most of the time" Denney

[Rick Denney]

While that may be a good analogy most of the time, it may not ring true here.

Sure it does. But you have to think of it the way people who design things think.

A design fulfills requirements, and requirements represent user needs. In terms of needs, a tuba player must:

1. Make a sound that reminds the listener of a tuba.
2. Play in tune.
3. Play at the appropriate dynamic.
4. Play the right notes at the right time.
5. Play musically.
6. Show up to the gig on time.
7. Play consistently well throughout the gig.
8. Play consistently well over 40 years worth of gigs.
9. Keep the maestro happy.

In order to meet those needs, the requirements for a tuba might be:

1. Make a characteristic sound.
2. Have manageable intonation.
3. Have good dynamic range.
4. Be responsive.
5. Fit with the player's musical sensibilities.
6. Be schleppable.
7. Allow good playing posture.
8. Be durably constructed.
9. Look like a tuba someone would want to pass within five feet of.

I submit that when you find a tuba that fulfills all these requirements, buy it. Obviously, different players will have different standards for each of these high-level requirements, and defining those standards is part of the Great Quest. The journey is most of the fun.

Mechanics tools also fulfill requirements, and those requirements also start with user needs. The car mechanic must:

1. Repair the car.
2. Take less time than the flat rate book to do so.
3. Not damage the part being repaired.
4. Avoid injury.

To meet these needs, the tool must:

1. Fit the task effectively.
2. Do nothing to slow the mechanic down...
2.1 ...by fitting poorly
2.2 ...by breaking
2.3 ...by damaging the part under repair
3. Apply stress on the part under repair where that part can withstand it.
4. Not break under design applied force, which is the application of force sufficient to break the part under repair. (The tool must be stronger than the part, if possible).

I have rounded bolts with Craftsman wrenches that Snap-On wrenches were able to turn--after being rounded. I have broken more Craftsman sockets than I care to remember, without using the cheater pipes over the tool handles that Snap-On wrenches reliably withstand. And so on. Pros choose the Snap-On tools, despite their breathtakingly high price, because of those requirements.

Professionals needs tools that fulfill their requirements and meet their needs. In many professions both high and low, those tools are expensive. In the grand scheme of things, tubas are not that expensive. That was my point.

Rick "who once worked as a mechanic" Denney

[iiipopes]

All I can say is the few Snap-On tools I have, as the Whitworth sockets for the fuel and oil fittings on my Jaguar E-type 1) aren't available anywhere else, 2) are works of art compared to a lot of other tools, and 3) are the easiest, most effective and most efficient hand tools to work with I have ever used.

Now, that said, for the average homeowner/backyard mechanic for everything else, and I include myself in that category, it is hard to beat the combination of relative value vs price point including no questions asked replacement warranty of a Craftsman brand tool, the main difference being, of course, the Snap-On doesn't need that warranty because it doesn't break in the first place!

[Rick Denney]

But I prefer, for simple jobs, to use that $4.99 cheap socket set. Works for me.

Not me. Most cheap 12-point sockets will stretch and round the corners on bolts that are really tight, or split. Snap-On sockets, with broached corners, apply the stress to the center of the bolt-head flat, rather than the corner. Gear-wrench is now using the same design (I suspect Snap-On's patent has finally expired), and I've been fairly pleased with their tools.

I can't afford Snap-On any more, and I use Craftsman Industrial. ("Craftsman" is now a brand applied to at least three grades of tools, with the Industrial being their premium brand.) They are...acceptable. But I've broken them, too.

Where I once used 1/2" drive Snap-On sockets, I must use 3/4" drive Craftsman sockets, such as for the axle bolts on my GMC motorhome, that are torqued to 350 foot pounds and then get tighter in use. Those often require a 6-foot cheater pipe.

But the needs of the weekend mechanic are different from those who make their living by not having their time wasted. Those guys do not make a lot of money, but they still find it worth it to invest in breathtakingly expensive tools. That was my point.

Actually, even now I hate having my time wasted, and Sears is a two-hour round trip. If the Snap-On truck arrived at my driveway the way it once did where I worked as a mechanic, I'd probably have more of them.

Rick "whose Snap-On tools were stolen in, oh, 1982, and who still misses them" Denney

[cambrook]

I like Rick's Snap On analogy - there are lots of very sensible reasons for using tools of such quality, particularly in a professional situation. There is also the issue of the convenience of having the Snap On truck come to you weekly to ask if you want to buy more

For me there is also a pleasure in using the best tool for the job - I love using my Festool woodworking tools for the same reason, I just wish I could justify buying more of them. If I was a professional woodworker I probably would do so.

Yes the best tubas are expensive, particularly the handmade ones - but I enjoy using them and can justify doing so.

[MaryAnn]

Well, I can't justify buying the quality of stuff that I do, except that I can afford it. My only justification is that when people like me buy high quality instruments, it helps keep the makers in business who might otherwise sell far fewer and then go out of business. Since I don't "wait in line" to buy an instrument, I don't feel that I'm preventing someone from having one who really can justify it by playing level.

That said, I admit to being insane, because I took up the oboe this summer. I have been pretty much literally blowing my brains out on an old Cabart with "extreme" resistance. But I have found a very good used Rigoutat, which is a high level pro instrument. Did you know that woodwinds "blow out" over a period of years and that ww players have to buy new every ten years or so, at big $$ per pop? They don't keep the same instrument for decades like we do. So my new-to-me Rigoutat has all the bells and whistles but is somewhat "blown out" from the owners POV. Since it's nine years old and not twenty, I figure its blown-outness is well within my range of acceptability, and I'm happy to fork over the dough to the pro who owns it, which will make his life easier in buying the new one that he needs. And it sure beats the living whoopee out of the old junker I was trying to learn to play on.

MA

[pwhitaker]

The oboe's a horn made of wood.
I'd play you a tune if I could,
But the reeds are a pain,
And the fingering's insane.
It's the ill wind that no one blows good.
> --Ogden Nash

[josh_kaprun]

I have not actually checked this out, but I heard from a violinist that it is not uncommon for a pro-level violinist to pay upwards of $50,000 JUST FOR THE BOW!!!

[Rick Denney]

[quote="ed"][/quote]

That's only the second time I've had to Adblock an image on Tubenet to keep anyone walking by my office seeing it.

Rick "the first time involved a female in a certain person's (Doc's) sig" Denney

[lgb&dtuba]

One some level I don't think the Snap-On analogy holds.

When they start gold plating their tools and adding fancy engraving, maybe. They'd also have to use exotic inlays. Make them out of precious metals from the far corners of the earth alloyed in certain arcane ways that mere mechanics couldn't possibly understand but believed in whole heartedly.

And of course, older Snap-On tools would have to appreciate in value because the materials had aged in some mysterious ways that improved their utility and beauty.

Mechanics could then cryogenically treat their sockets to improve them further. Or remove the lacquers.

Feel free to add your own excesses

[iiipopes]

Mechanics could then cryogenically treat their sockets to improve them further.

Already being done and debated:
http://www.onecryo.com/manufact.htm
http://www.woodweb.com/knowledge_base/A ... _Real.html