Which tuba in this band?

[imperialbari]

http://tinyurl.com/47zuxu

Is it a Miraphone Eb?

K

[imperialbari]

BOB! YOU'RE SLIPPING, MAN!!! Not a single comment on the sarrusophone? Don't you want one in your low instrument ensemble? Hello?

Klaus, I do not know WHAT that tuba is, but I had to give old Bob a hard time. Sorry to intrude, sir!

No problem!

I got the link because of the sarrusophone in the first place.

Klaus

[Dean E]

Looks very large for an Eb. There's a still photo at this site:
http://www.jazznut.com/" target="_blank" target="_blank

[Dan Schultz]

Based on the still image... the horn appears to NOT be an Eb. It's probably a BBb tuba. It's does not appear to be a Mirafone, either. Unless it's had some pretty serious custom work done to it. There's probably a link on the band's webpage to email the owner.

[tclements]

I went to school with the tubist, Keith Baltz and he always plays BBb. Years ago, he bought an old La Sete BBb from me. I'm guessing that that is an old 186 BBb, bell front. Np comment about the contra sarrousaphone playing??

[J.c. Sherman]

The bell neck on the tuba looks wrong for a Miraphone. But it's BBb, no doubt.

Cool Sarrusophone, but he seams trapped in one octave... with three octave keys to master, who can blame him!

Could be my crap computer speakers, though!

J.c.S.

[OldsRecording]

The bell neck on the tuba looks wrong for a Miraphone. But it's BBb, no doubt.

Cool Sarrusophone, but he seams trapped in one octave... with three octave keys to master, who can blame him!

Could be my crap computer speakers, though!

J.c.S.

Sounds kinda like a bass sax with mononeucleosis...

[jobriant]

I know what this tuba is, and I know who owns it, and I've played it, and I want it!

Believe it or not, it's a Hirschbrunner (did I spell that right?).

Here's the story....

About 30 or 40 years ago, a fellow from the Stockton-Sacramento, CA area was touring the Hirschbrunner factory in Switzerland when he spotted the body of a bell-front tuba, sans valve cluster, laying on the floor under a workbench. He asked what it was, and was told that it was the prototype of a Hirschbrunner BBb recording-bell tuba, a model they had considered making but then decided not to put into production.

He said, "if you'll put a valve cluster on it, I'll buy it." They did, and he did.

He used the horn for a number of years, and then (as I was told by Keith Baltz, the present owner), pretty much retired from playing. At some point, Keith had played this horn, and told the owner, "If you ever want to sell this tuba, please call me first." Last July (some 20 years after Keith last saw the horn), the owner called him and offered it for sale. Keith snapped it up immediately. Three or four days later, Keith played it with the Devil Mountain Jazz Band (the band in the Video) at the South Bay Trad Jazz Society in Sunnyvale, CA. He let me try it out, and I immediately tried to buy it for nearly twice what he'd paid for it, but he won't sell, !@#$%^&*. (I don't know where I'd have found the money, but I'd have come up with it someplace!!!)

The Saruusophone Player in the video is Pete Main, the trombonist is Glenn Calkins, and the pianist is Virginia Tichenor, and I play regularly with all three of them in Ted Shafer's Jelly Roll Jazz Band.

Anyway this is a GREAT tuba, and it appears to be a one-of-a kind instrument, supposedly the only bell-front tuba that Hirschbrunner ever made.

Jim O'Briant
Gilroy, CA

[imperialbari]

Believe it or not, it's a Hirschbrunner (did I spell that right?).

You did, only Hirsbrunner doesn’t.

K