PMEA convention

[ken k]

I was at PMEA the last two days and both Custom Music and Tuba Exchange had booths there. Since it was an educators conference most of the horns they had there were the BBb variety.

At teh Tuba Exchange I played the TE models and was quite impressed especially for the price. The TE-2110, a compact 4/4 rotor horn, was only cost $1895 and played very well. It had a very focused tone and the pitch lined up very well. The larger 5/4 horn (TE_818R4 - $2495!) they had there was not as good and the rep Steve Truckenbrod achnowledged that they have had better examples of that horn but they were sold. The sound was nice enough but the low register and valves were not very good. Perhaps a valve adjustment would have opened up the horn a bit? The valves needed a good going over but in general the construction of the TE models was very nice. The horn I wish they would have had there is their TE-700 EEb comper like the Besson 981 fopr only $4295. When mine gets stolen i guess i will have to try one of those. For the money these horns seem hard to beat. I am sure playing them next to a competing model may have shown some differences but I will say they were quite a good value for the money.

Neal Campbell from Custom Music was also there and they had a full set of their Sanders Educational tubas in addition to a few B&S horns. The Sanders Conservatory is a 186-ish tuba and plays very well. Comes with a case for $3795! Very focused sound, and the low register flowed easily through the fourth valve register.

He had a new huge Professional BBb, PT-605 i believe and it was like an organ with a full and enveloping sound. Quite an instrumet. i did not ask the price...if you hve to ask.... He had a few other CCs and Sanders but I only really played those two... We got talking shop and time passed pretty quickly. So many tubas so little time (or money!)

I played nice Weril sousaphone at the Gemstone booth. It was quite a substantial horn and had a great sound. The balance was a bit weird on my shoulder, however. It seemd to be front heavy to me, even without using any mouthpeice bits, but it really played.

The highlight of the conference was a performance by the Montgomery County Concert Band which featured a performance of the Phillip Sparke Tuba Concerto by Carol Jantsch. Her sound was so clear and focused yet warm and effortless. The piece itself is quite nice. While it is not a "flashy" kind of technical showpiece, it defintely takes chops to play, since it covers a very wide range (probably close to 3 octaves) and incorporates long sweeping legato phrases, which she played flawlessly. She made it sound easy. There were many phrases above the staff and she just sang it. One little disconcerting issue (and I feel like who am I to even mention it) but I was surprised to hear her inhale loudly through the tuba. At first it was a bit distracting. After awhile it became less noticable. Is this a comon practice?

Then the band ended the concert with Stars & Stripes Forever and of course Ms. Jantsch played the picc solo. While I have done this many times in the past I will say my rendition never sounded lke that! Awesome! She did not even break a sweat!

Your tuba beat reporter, ken k