Why did you like the tuba?

[Hank74]

First of all, let me wish you a wonderful Fourth of July. There was a great video over twenty years ago that had a younger Matt Dillon play the sousaphone. It was entitled "Jean Shepherd's Great American Fourth of July."

In any case, my main post has to do with how did you get attracted to the tuba. I've heard posts here that a band director wanted you to try it out or there was a need for a tuba player and nobody else wanted to play it. What I wanted to ask here is what convinced you that the tuba was the instrument that you should go. Would it be the low sound, large size, the idea that people will see you play in a band, etc.?

For me, I went with the tuba mainly for the first two reasons of sound and size. I've always been interested in this great instrument for a long time and now feel fortunate that I can play one effectively. Currently own a K-90 contra, silver Jupiter sousa, and a 4 valve BBb rotary.

Enjoy the holiday! One that made John Phillip Sousa proud.

Hank74

[CrappyEuph]

In fourth grade, I was hell-bent on playing an instrument that was bigger than I was, regardless of what it sounded like. My band director apparently didn't believe that a 9-year-old girl could play tuba, so I got the next best thing: a smelly gold bell-front euphonium with holes in it that she taught me to play sideways, so that the instrument was horizontal in my lap and I hunched over to reach the mouthpiece. It was still bigger than me, though - I had to carry it on a luggage cart for three years.

- Jamie

[windshieldbug]

For me it was hearing what my soon-to-be teacher's students could do. When I asked them how they became able to play so well, to a person they credited that teacher's efforts. When I inquired of the college if I might study with him, I was informed that his course load was so heavy that he now only tought tuba majors. "No problem" I gamely replied, and started trying to work up anything on an ancient Eb. To his everlasting credit, he allowed me to re-audition on that tuba, even though I had already completed two years on majoring euphonium. He thought he heard something, accepted me, and my whole life changed. While I liked euphonium, I found as I studied more that I loved playing tuba, being the bass brass voice. And instead of being someone who threw things into the tuba, I now was the person trying to avoid such objects. Go figure...

[smurphius]

Ahhh, the bringing of the tuba into my life... What a great day!! Haha.

For me, I was in the 7th grade, and we had a bad kid who played tuba in my junior high school band. He was the rotton apple, or the ugly duckling you could say. Needless to say, we ended up with one less tuba player in my band. At the time, I was playing trumpet, and was doing relatively well for a person who wasn't able to take private lessons. However, I had always been fascinated by this large beast. The low sounds it could produce amazed me, not to mention back then, oom (pah) oom (pah) was cool!

Basically I had to beg my band director to let me switch instruments. She was a little black lady with the darkest black skin, standing at a towering 4 foot 9 inches. She's one of the few heros I have in my life. She agreed to let me switch to the tuba (after I probably drove her nuts in begging to do so). From that February day of my 7th grade year, I began my love affair with the tuba. I haven't stopped ever since!!

[Dan Schultz]

4th grade in 1958 (I think). Don't really remember why but I'm glad I started with the tuba and not one of those stupid trumpets!

[MichaelDenney]

A favorite uncle whom we younger kids looked up to had made all-state on tuba, and that planted a seed. And also when we went to pick up my older sister from high school band one day, I gave one of the sousaphones a toot and found that it came naturally.

Like nearly all my siblings I started on the family trumpet (originally the same uncle's) and then later switched to a school horn--the biggest, the shiniest, and most awe inspiring one for me.

Almost all the others who started on that trumpet switched to French horn. While not as magnificent as the tuba it's still a noble choice. At least it's a brass instrument, although it does consort often with woodwind ensembles, so you have to wonder a little.

[Leland]

I really don't remember which came first -- so here are both of my stories:

Sometime after my first season of drum corps and learning valves on baritone (I had been playing trombone exclusively), my mom asked if I wanted to come to church quintet and maybe play tuba.

At about the same time, we were short of contra players, and I was asked to try out a contra during "hell week". I played some notes on it, and the low brass instructor says, "You sound pretty good, wanna switch?" I keep skirting the question for the next two days, until finally, "Oh come on, you're gonna play contra -- start learning the drill."

I really don't know why I stuck with the bass brass after that. I didn't even march sousaphone until college. The tuba has a lot going against it -- it's big, heavy, unwieldy, the butt of many jokes, and doesn't even get the most interesting parts (the euphonium, on the other hand, often gets the best of all band parts -- melody, countermelody, and low brass features).

I think it comes down to the sound. Nothing more. There's just nothing else like it.

Well, there's also the fact that other tuba players seem to be the easiest to hang around with, too.

[THE TUBA]

All of the students interested in taking band class had to "audition" for their instrument at the end of the fifth grade year. When I say "audition," it basicly means try out an instrument or two in front of the middle school band director, and he will advise you which one to pick. You can choose three instruments to try out on. I wanted to play drums, so I put that as my first option. After that, I wrote down trumpet, because some of my friends were, and then, just to be funny, I wrote tuba. After the middle school band director asked me to repeat a few rhythms for him with drumsticks, he quickly decided that I was not fit to play the drums. I then buzzed on a trumpet and baritone (our middle school assumed that 6th graders were to small to play a real tuba). The sound that came out of the baritone sounded better than that of the trumpet. I read the tuba parts, and switched to playing a "real" tuba the following year.

[tubeast]

I joined a youth band as flugelhorn / trumpet player.
We get three years of band-sponsored lessons and kinda goofed around during that time.
Two years later I took private lessons, working seriously for one year.
(I´d say practising 6-7 hours a week is good enough for a kid with no competition or honor-band to go for, and no inclinations towards a pro career).
Technique and sound improved, but range didn´t. So there were three things that led me to the real thing:

- At that time we had a charismatic and talented tuba player in band, and I stood in awe at what he could do with his horn, both in band and as a soloist.
- My private teacher was a music ed major, his primary instrument had switched from trumpet to tuba.
- My Dad had a collection of brass instruments that featured (among many others) a raw brass tuba and a helicon, hanging at the wall of our living room.

So one day during vacation I picked up the tuba and … cleaned it!! Just because. I know I´m weird.
Of course I fooled around a bit on it and just fell in love.
That was about three months before final exams for Abitur (German type graduation is not just finishing 12th grade, we have final exams in 13th).
I got drafted for military service right after school, and as I spent most of my spare time practising in the basement of our barracks the horn kept me away from beer-guzzling with my peers, I even saved my money for a visit to my host family in the US!! (Most colleagues in military ended up owning less money after service than they had before)

[Uncle Buck]

A year or two before I was old enough to start beginning band, I attended a high school marching band contest where my sister was marching. When I watched the high school band from my school district perform, I was mesmerized watching the tubas in the band. (I believe they were fiberglass sousas.) I thought they were the coolest looking thing I had ever seen.

My parents tried to talk me into a different instrument, but I was a pretty stubborn kid. When I started beginning band and got my tuba, my bus driver wouldn't let me bring it home on the bus. Because of that, the band director switched me to baritone for a while. I was doing OK on that, and I think the director was inclined to leave me there, but I was persistent and eventually got switched back to tuba. (It took me several weeks before I stopped playing everything up an octave in the baritone range.)

[Joe Baker]

Someone asked last year what we tell people when they ask why we play the tuba. My answer then, which I'm standing by:

I tell them "because I like knowing things that very few people know". They ask, "what things?". I just smile.

But there ARE things that we understand that most people don't. I don't think most people realize just how much the bass of the band matters. The trumpet players may be the stars, the middle brass the moon, the woodwinds the whispy clouds, the percussion the thunder; but we are the night sky. Without us, the drama could play out, but no one would very much notice. There's a control thing, sure; but a band without the bass is like a painting without a canvas.
_______________________________
Joe Baker, who thinks all tubists know this, and very few others.

[Biggs]

Who says I like it?

[Leland]

Who says I like it?

Hehe...

I also jokingly say, "Well, some people get a big object to 'compensate' for something... we play tuba to 'accommodate'."

[tubatooter1940]

Tuba was my first instrument and coming back to it after a career as a trumpet/trombonist/vocalist was like coming home.I like it best.Tuba gives me the range and speed I wish I had on other instruments.Tuba makes me happy!

[ThomasDodd]

What I wanted to ask here is what convinced you that the tuba was the instrument that you should go. Would it be the low sound, large size, the idea that people will see you play in a band, etc.?

Why do I love my wife or kids?

Why do I like the cars I do?

Talk about questions with no answers.

[Tubaman485]

A long long time ago, I went to a chicago symphony concert with Arnold Jacobs playing the tuba. I cannot remember the concert now but I parents always tell me that I was so blown away by his amazing sound that I decided I wanted to play tuba and come 5th grade I started. I love that deep, dark, fat sound that you can get on the horn.

JB

[Biggs]

In all seriousness, I love how the tuba is an instant conversation piece/starter. Especially with hot girls.

[winston]

.

[Dylan King]

I was a fat kid. I knew somehow I'd end up playing the fattest instrument in the end.

[TexTuba]

I didn't like the tuba at first because I didn't know what it really was. I was put on it when I first started band in middle school. To be honest I didn't start liking the tuba until my senior year of high school. How lame of me...

Ralph