The Sound of Cimbasso?

[imperialbari]

Sam Gnagey’s conglomerated cimbassos appeal to me as do some of the high-end factory models.

My experiments with making flexible kids’ bugles in Eb alto and Bb tenor from trumpet bells, ½” garden hose, and Kelly 12C plastic mouthpieces merged with the reading of this thread into a funny vision:

The expensive parts of the Gnagey creations are the valve blocks and their modifications. The bells are from discarded conical brasses. The bells and the main bugle tubing will take some work for de-denting, bending, and assembly, but the main cost factor remains being the valve blocks.

I am a collector, so do I have relevant valve blocks? I think so!

The compensating block on my Boosey and Bessons in F, Eb, and BBb would be fine. So would the 4 valve non-comping blocks of the Conns 28K and 40K plus the York Master.

The catch is, that these valve blocks do fine services, where they are, and they shall not be unsoldered.

Could they still be utilised for cimbassos? My rotten 3D imagination says yes.

If I could get the appropriate tubing fitting as males for the outgoing (the first) female branches of the main tuning slides, then I could attach lengths of ¾” or 1” hose to them thereby getting my cylindrical main bugle tubing.

What about bells? Having a Kanstul G marching baritone with two main tuning slides, a couple of oval Kaiserbaritöne, and the YEP-641 it should be possible to find a relevant corpus, where the hose could be attached to the second (wide) receiver of the main tuning slide.

The set-ups would be unwieldy and would take a next-generation of dual tuba tamers.

But if the experiment would pan out reasonably, a second main tuning slide might be found for one or more of the tubas and a switch valve mounted. The cimbasso cylindrical main bugle portion might be made in brass tubing.

What would this lead to? Parts already in the possession of most tubists might fulfil the function of an instrument, which only a minority of tubists possess: the cimbasso.

Dreaming!

Klaus

[Dan Schultz]

I first played this one at Evansville's "Jinglebones"... the trombone guys answer to TubaChristmas.


FUN!

[Wyvern]

Well this last week I have been seriously considering getting a Cimbasso and managed to borrow a Melton F on trial. I will have to confess that the cimbasso is not to my liking!

Firstly I found it really unwieldy to handle. I have a dedicated 20' x 10' music room at home and I was still worried about bashing something moving it around - it is so large and T shaped - must take up the space of at least two tubas. I don't know how players in the confines of an opera pit manage?

Then I found it incredibly stuffy to blow against a tuba, the intonation on the example I tried did not impress, while the sound coming out of the bell just seemed unreal to me - a bass trombone like sound, rather than tuba sound. Just not my sort of sound!

Playing my F tuba afterwards was sheer delight!

But all the same - those of you who like playing cimbasso, I wish you all the best. It's just, I won't be joining your ranks.

[Sam Gnagey]

Hey Neptune,
You should get in contact with Owen Slade. I shipped one of my E-flat cimbassi to him about 8 months ago. You might be able to give that one a blow to compare with the Melton.
Sam

[Mike-ICR]

I have a dedicated 20' x 10' music room at home and I was still worried about bashing something moving it around - it is so large and T shaped - must take up the space of at least two tubas.

Part of the that wonderful 'Cimbasso sound' comes from its shape but they also exist in the traditional tuba shape. The intonation and stuffiness is no better but they take up much less space and aren't as cumbersome. The modern copies are easily built and are usually made from baritone bodies, tuba valvesets and a lot of cylidrical tubing. If you can get your hands on one I suggest you give it a try.

[imperialbari]

..... while the sound coming out of the bell just seemed unreal to me - a bass trombone like sound, rather than tuba sound.......

Maybe unreal, but isn’t the trombone sound the very point of the cimbasso?

We then may enter the discussions of the finer details of sound differences and the differeing feels of resistance between valved and slided trombones. TubeNet assumes that cimbassos shall be played by the orchestra’s tuba player. That is a very practical approach in orchestras with 3 players in the trombone section, as the cimbasso very often constitutes the bass line below 3 trombones in Italian music. However I have known two orchestras with 4 and 5 trombonists respectively, where the cimbasso was played by the bass trombonist.

Klaus

[quesonegro]

I think it should be said that the different cimbassi out there are very different in sound quality, intonation and playability.
I had the chance to try all the cimbassi available at the Frankfurt Music fair last year and the difference between the different builders is huge.
In my opinion the top of the line was clearly Haag and Lätsch. In all the others I found the exact problems you are talking about.
I haven't had a chance to play Sam's horn and I have not tried the new G & P either, so I can't have an opinion about them...I have heard good things about Sam's horn, though, I hope to get my hands on one sometime! That goes for the G & P as well since both are with piston valves and I'm curious about the difference.
My experience is also that it's not the same to play tuba and to play the cimbasso.
The resistance is totally different and, of course, the sound is nothing alike.
As with any other instrument, it takes practise, and what horn you have is as important as with any other instrument.

I'm exceedingly happy with my Haag but it takes quite a bit of work for me to get it to sound the way I want it to, as does my tuba, as does my bass trombone

//Mattis

[quesonegro]

Incidentally, if anybody is interrested, tomorrow, the 12th of march, I'm live, on air from the University of Aachen, in germany with the WDR Big Band, playing a feature on the cimbasso. The broadcast starts at 20.00 CET (3.00 PM in New York). We play two sets, my feature being the first tune of the second set.

The live stream can be found on:
http://www.wdr.de/wdrlive/radio.phtml?channel=wdr3" target="_blank

Cheers

//Mattis

[imperialbari]

Today arrived a main part for my experiment with using the valve section of one or more of my basses and sending the air from the main tuning slide through a hose to the branches and the bell of some sort of baritone/euph. Lars Jonasson of I. K. Gottfried had found a scrapped Schenkelaars baritone in his hell-box:

A.JPG

He took of the leadpipe and valves, as I have no torch:

B.JPG

I have located a local source for a roll of 3/4" reinforced hose, but haven’t fetched it yet. I only have some length of 1/2" hose at home for now, so I measured the tubing of the brass carcass (1.9m) and added 2.1m of hose to bring it to a pitch of around Eb. That set-up did not sound convincing played with the PT-50 I used on my Conn 40K, when the post arrived. A later test with a Denis Wick #2 didn’t work out much better. The discrepancy between the long narrow bore of .500" and the rather wide bell section was too much. The sound was much better, when I put the hose to the straight bell portion of a 1920 narrow G bass trombone.

K

[imperialbari]

The PT-50 obviously was too big, but I follow a practise pattern going from large to smaller, which I did not want to interrupt especially early in the day.

Actually the next tested mouthpiece was the MF-3H (my "large" Eb and CC mpc) which wasn’t better than the PT-50 or the DW2. However I still consider the main problem being the too narrow bore of the long hose portion of the bore as compared to the bell section. With the smaller G bassbone bell all mouthpieces sounded much better.

But I actually plan to use a shallower mouthpiece, which should be on its way to me right now: the blokepiece.

K

[imperialbari]

Jebus in a peach tree! That thing's a monster!

Klaus, you should attach your 7B slide to that baritone bell!

I like the sight of that slide-o-phonium, but I wouldn’t want one myself for ergonomic reasons.

Many bassboners assemble their bells and slides in a very open angle with the purpose of a wide field of free eyesight. I have tried that, but my sore wrist doesn’t like the leftward torsion effect of a heavy bell section. Hence I assemble my bones with the bell rim as close to the slide as possible.

My slided thing coming closest to a cimbasso is the B&H Imperial G&D bass trombone, one of the last made in 1978 before they went fully out of fashion. In 1978 I saw the bassboner in one of the top British brass bands play that model, but without the handle, which is possible down to the Bb, that is the open pedal of the Bb bone (V6 on the G&D bone). I try to learn playing with the handle, but fast legato takes more work, than I put into the project currently. Even with the handle low A is barely there and Ab not all.

One trombone tutor written by a GDR trombonist revealed the German approach to full chromatism on the single valve Bb bassbone. Every note possible with the slide was played without the valve, which was tuned to Eb rather than to F. That allowed for the low B natural.

I want to do the same on my G&D Imperial, but haven’t solved the problem of the very short pull on the D valve slide. I will have to get some tubing to extend that slide to C. I have contact with a British repair guy, but he didn’t recognize the measurements I sent him. Part of the problem being the British shift from Imperial to metric measuring.

K

[quesonegro]

I recorded a simple video of me playing a cimbasso feature with the WDR Big Band.
"Waterfront" again, this time in a proper arrangement by the great Helge Albin. A nice 12/8 take on the old standard.
The video is pretty boring since I was myself playing...it's simply a tripod on the balcony, so no fancy shots
It was a lot of fun, though, to get to play in front of the band and I enjoyed it immensely.
I hope you might like it too!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hPJc5AksAXU" target="_blank

Cheers

//Mattis

[imperialbari]

The D-valve of the Imperial G bass bone has a 0.543" bore. I did the reverse test of setting the caliper at 0.547" and it will not go into the bore. My sample doesn’t fit the timetable listed by Douglas Yeo for his sample. Small wonder as mine is a different model. The valve wrap is more like that of the Bach Stradivarius tenors from before open-wrap, and there is no semicircle balancer in the tuning slide bow. I would like to put a Bach balancer on the tuning slide stay, but the tuning slide of the D-valve doesn’t allow that.

My mouthpiece is a DW SM2M. The sound is good, but the responce isn’t impressive a higher dynamics. Practising more intensely will be tried before going for a new mpc. Only the tubas are higher on the agenda right now.

Klaus

[quesonegro]

Thanks LJV, I'm glad you like it!
I'll try to record and post more stuff in the future...just need to set up my workroom

Cheers

//Mattis

[cambrook]

Great work Mattis!! You and the Haag sound great, can you tell us about the custom G&W mouthpiece?

Cheers,

Cam

[quesonegro]

Hey Cam.
I contacted Ivan Giddings and had them make me a special mp. Basically using their Churada as a template but modifying the rim, making it narrower and adding a little mass at the shank. As a bass trombone player I felt the tuba rim was to thick, I wanted something like a contra mp but with a little more mass. It works great for me, as a doubler, and i use one on my F-tuba as well. Ivan is great and I'm very happy with the result!

I had three made for me, all in titanium.

Cheers

//Mattis

[imperialbari]

Looks like it has a pretty sharp inner edge, which I like. Is that along their current designs?

Klaus

[quesonegro]

We didn't change the inner profile of the cup, so I guess that inner side of the rim is the same as their current line of mp's...
They have a different outer profile now though.

Check it out at:

http://www.gwmouthpieces.com/" target="_blank

I simply called Ivan and he was very helpful...

//Mattis

[quesonegro]

The specs on the Churada are:

Rim Diameter 30.480mm, 1.20inches; Throat size 7.874mm, .310 inches

Pretty much the rim diameter of a contrabass trombone mp but with a larger backbore and tuba shank.

//Mattis

[quesonegro]

If anybody's interrested, I posted a new cimbasso video yesterday on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUJ9wK008YQ" target="_blank

Nothing very elaborate, just me messing around at home and recording a little, but I had a good time!

Live long and prosper!!

//Mattis