Alto horn mouthpieces

[Bob Kolada]

My father picked up a Conn Eb/F mellophone for 5 bucks at a yard sale a while back. I attempt to play it every now and then.

How big do alto horn mouthpieces get? Mine has a Conn 4, and the shank seems to fit fine into most trumpets (perhaps even going further than a trumpet mouthpiece). I'd love to pick up a cleaner, trumpet-shaped horn to use in my jazz combo and possibly a brass quintet but to play it for real I think I'd do best with a bigger mouthpiece. Looking around on the internet, it seems that alto horn mouthpieces top out at around 20mm. My Conn 4 slid all the way into a Besson alto horn, so I'm assuming for the horn I'm looking at (a sweet old Conn at Dillon's- http://www.dillonmusic.com/HeleoCart/Pr ... 75943.aspx) I will need something with the small receiver.

Will the modern alto mp's out there fit into a smaller receiver? Is there some other way to get a larger mp for these horns without shelling out more than I would likely spend on the horn?

[Tuba Guy]

I have an alto mouthpiece. It's the same shank size as a trumpet. My problem when using this (on a mellophonium, so very similar to your situation) is that while I was able to pump in the low range, anything above a C in the staff took an insane amount of chop power. I almost hurt myself trying to play a couple of the solos in the book. In the end, I borrowed a trumpet player's concert mouthpiece, and was able to finish the game.
(I'll upload pictures when my computer and my phone can connect)

[Donn]

I believe today there are alto horn and mellophone shanks. I don't have the latter, but believe it's similar to cornet. They fit the assortment of queer marching brass horns that get foisted on French horn players.

The alto horn shank is only a little smaller than tenor trombone - it falls into the trombone receiver but doesn't rattle around in there, and a trombone mouthpiece went into our old Besson student model alto, though just 1/4 inch or so. Much bigger than cornet mouthpiece, which will rattle around in the receiver. The instruments we have around the house that fit this are that Besson ('50s?), a modern Yamaha, and an old oval extra fat one with model/make in Cyrillic.

I've never tried an older American alto horn, so don't know for sure, but if I had to bet one way or the other, I would guess that instruments in the saxhorn form of the traditional alto horn will take an alto mouthpiece, and something that in one way or another resembles a French horn will take the mellophone mouthpiece (or a cornet mouthpiece.)

Luckily, the horn you're looking at there at Dillon's is in the hands of people who would surely be able to answer this question, but I would guess alto horn mouthpiece. I think the Denis Wick 1 is the biggest mouthpiece commonly available, but they would know the answer to that one too.

Dudley Fosdick, a '30s jazz musician and one of the greats in the category, played the mellophone. In the picture I've seen, he had one of the marching band type horns, trumpet configuration with a wide bell flare. Really sweet. I'm not so optimistic on the potential of the larger alto horn for jazz. Kind of like the euphonium there - too rigid for that style of expression.

[Dan Schultz]

If it's one of these... http://www.xs4all.nl/~cderksen/Conn16E1965image.html .... it's an 'animal' all to itself. The mouthpiece that came with these horns is clearly about .025" SMALLER than a trumpet mouthpiece. A 'regular' altohorn mouthpiece is the same size as a trumpet mouthpiece.... and will only go into the receiver a very short distance... maybe 3/16" it you're lucky.

I have two of those goofy horns here. If you want the mouthpieces... you gotta by the horns with them!

I expect that you could ream out the receivers on those marching Eb/F horns to accept a trumpet mouthpiece but the cup would be quite a bit smaller and maybe no quite so manageable.... as if they played well with the original MP!