if you played a school tuba

[Tom Coffey]

I started on, and used at home through high school, an ancient Besson sousaphone. It came to me in brown patina, without a touch of lacquer anywhere, and was built with nickel silver on the valve tubing. It was quite heavy, very well constructed, and played very very well. During my first year, I only had the body--no bell. When I graduated from high school, the district "retired" the horn and gave it to me. I still have it, thirty six years after graduation, and I cherish the horn. However, the real gifts were the patient and talented guys who taught me to play, and the great band program maintained by the Sycamore School District in the suburbs of Cincinnati. Those experiences got me on the right track and kept me there!

[TubaTodd]

Middle School: We had Yamaha 103 tubas. A few of them were brand new and a few older but in decent shape. We also had a couple King 2341 bell front tubas. None of us used them. They were too big for us.

High School: I had a terrible selection. There was a Miraphone 184 (I think) and it was severely beat up. The bell had so many creases and cracks it had holes. We also had a meinl weston detachable bell tuba. It was in better shape, but the valves needed to be redone. Because of the poor valves I used the Miraphone almost exclusively. I took that Miraphone to tuba christmas a few times....with duct tape keeping the bell together. It wasn't until the latter half of my senior year, my band director ordered and received 2 brand-new King 2341 (detachable bell models) tubas. By that point I owned my own tuba. So I only used the 2341 when at school and for graduation....outdoors.

[opus37]

As a follow up, I met the current band director of my high school band last night. I learned that he found the MW 25 I played in 1968. He had it restored and is using it as their main good tuba in the band. The horn looked good. I'm happy it is still around and sounding good.

[Jesse Brook]

I was given our school's newest tuba, a Jupiter 382. That was an easy-playing horn. I used it for three years in band, pit bands, and orchestras. The school had a policy of never fixing the horns, just replacing them. Thus, when I watched in horror as it fell from some risers (don't leave your tuba on it's bell), they left it with the flattened spot on the bow and the wrinkles on the bell. The valves on that tuba were terrible. If left for more than a day without oil, they would freeze right up. I liked that tuba, but didn't learn my lesson about leaving it resting on the bell until later.

There were 7 other tubas, only 2 of them frequently used. 2 Yamaha 103s, alike in scruffiness and missing parts, 1 Yamaha 201 with a flattened back branch and leadpipe (that was the second best), 1 Piper 4-rotor (Cerveny 686), with more rattles than you could shake a stick at, 1 Lyon&Healey B-flat with a duct tape leadpipe (not working), 1 anonymous B-flat that looked as if it had been destroyed a few times, and 1 Academy (Dutch) E-flat that I got working and started fiddling around with in class.

[TubaSteve]

I started out in middle school with some Holton fiberglass Sousaphones. They were actually fairly good horns. They needed cleaning, but were not beat up badly. There was a tuba that had been destroyed, that was when I first was exposed to vandals and how I detested it. Our director was a tuba player, in his first year of teaching. (1973 ) In 8th grade, he got a new 3/4 horn that had a detachable bell. A fiberglass for home, and a brass one for school. I cared for that like it was gold. In HS, we had 4 Reynolds TB-11 and a Holton BB-350 that were all fresh from rebuild when I arrived. I played a TB-11 with a new upright bell and in my junior year I moved to a Meinl Weston 20. I also played my Roth-Reynolds Sousaphone at that time, but took a Holton fiberglass Sousa on a trip to West Germany. I am fairly certain that one of my Reynolds is actually one of the horns from way back then.

Steve