Arnold Jacobs Helleberg

Alex C · Post by **Alex C** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 10:27 am

I was completely surprised and disappointed to read how Mr. Jacobs' name and legacy are being misappropriated by Canadian Brass.

In trying to think how I am going to respond, I decided that my response is to return the mouthpiece to Chuck at CB and ask for my money back because of their poor business practices. I doubt I'll get anything back but I am compelled to do something.

I'll keep you posted if and when there's a response.

brianf · Post by **brianf** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 11:27 am

Yes, you are right. You must think twice before posting about CB here. I thought about it a lot since I found out about this last August. I've thought about it even more before deciding to take them on, Brian vs. CB doesn't sound good on paper. If Mr Jacobs was still here he would have told me to take care of this.

I don't want to but I have to!

MaryAnn · Post by **MaryAnn** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 2:49 pm

Chuck(G) wrote:Are folks really that sensitive to tiny differences in mouthpieces?

Surprisingly so, at least for some. I have a good friend who is a pro horn player with a touring Broadway show. He not only can tell the difference between two supposedly identical cups, but the difference can be heard in his playing. The same goes for rims.....I recently started using a new (screw) rim and liked it a lot because it increased my endurance quite a bit; he tried it, and we did a play-listen test using the same cup and my rim vs his rim. It is possible to see a difference in the rims but it is not any huge visible difference. I could hear, and he could hear, and his partner could hear, a difference in both his tone and articulation between the rims. It opened up his high range but lessened his tone quality. But he liked the rim so much that he bought one (he had them send two "identical" rims, one of which screwed on his cup and the other wouldn't due to thread differences) and he bought the "good" one and sent the other back. THEN because of the difference in sound he changed to a slightly larger cup, and is happy with that setup.
Some of the very high level pros are THAT sensitive to equipment.
Me....I can play on anything for a couple days, but then things start to fall apart and I have to go back to my standard cup-rim setup. So I guess I'm sensitive too, but the results are pretty far down the scale.
MA

Chuck(G) · Post by **Chuck(G)** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 3:16 pm

MaryAnn wrote:Surprisingly so, at least for some. I have a good friend who is a pro horn player with a touring Broadway show. He not only can tell the difference between two supposedly identical cups, but the difference can be heard in his playing.

For horn and trumpet, I can understand--the durned things are so TEENY that small changes could have a proportionally large effect. But we're talking about tuba mouthpieces here...and I'd think that they'd be a lot more forgiving.

TubaRay · Post by **TubaRay** » Sat Dec 18, 2004 7:30 pm

I believe we could probably argue the mouthpiece thing until Jesus comes again and not come to a consensus. Personally, I believe there are noticable differences. Can I tell the difference between two PT-36s, two Conn Hellebergs, etc.? No. But, I sure can tell the difference between my Mike Finn 3H and my Conn Helleberg.

As to Brian's post above: I think it is sad that there is a dispute concerning Jake's mouthpiece, but I admire Brian's loyalty to Jake and to Jake's family. I am looking forward to the Army Band Tuba-Euph Conference. I have wanted to hear his lecture for a long time now.