Neptune wrote:bloke wrote:have something that SOUNDS like a Bb but is as nimble as an Eb...
That is to my mind the undoubted
big attraction of C tubas and why they are ideal for orchestral use. If that makes them more difficult to design and build, then another very good reason for the greater cost.
Remember even the most expensive handmade C's such as the 'Baer', Nirschl and Yamayork are not expensive compared to professional wind and string instruments.
NB When I visited the Meinl-Weston factory I was told the 'Baer' is particularly difficult to make
Jonathon, I don't think I can agree that C tubas are more difficult to build than Bb tubas. I might agree that they are more difficult to design (and here I agree with Bloke's comments), and maybe to tweak during R&D testing, but once designed it seems to me the same brass-bending goes into each.
C tubas often have a fifth valve, and that should add to the cost (and also support the willingness of buyers to pay a higher price).
I suspect that the 6450 is "particularly difficult to make" because it is "particularly big", and because MW thinks it can fetch a "particularly high price" for which they will need "particularly persuasive BS". It may have more hand-hammering than tubas with machine-formed parts, and it may have more hand-finishing, which is made all the more difficult because of the size of the instrument, but that's not the reason they are priced at over $20K.
There's nothing new with their line of persuasion, by the way. I remember gasping at the price (just under $13,000) of the early Yorkbrunner I tried out at the ITEC in Austin in the middle 80's. I was a returning novice and my thinking just didn't have that many digits. In response to my gasp, the representative, who was from the factory in Switzerland, explained how difficult it was to build a tuba from a flat sheet of brass. Again, I suspect it's all the more difficult to build a big tuba than a small one--no argument from me. But my point in recalling this story is that manufacturers will ALWAYS justify high prices with a claim of high costs, and often it is BS that perpetuates the myth that higher prices get passed along to the consumer without punishment (the airlines, for example, can only wish this were true). If the costs rise to the point that a price increase is necessary, then the price might go up, but the usual next step is to lay off or retask workers because of reduced demand (unless the manufacturer finds a way to persuade buyers that the higher price brings them higher value, even if just in terms of prestige, often by claiming that it's "particularly difficult to make"). If the price doesn't go up, the next step is usually to lay off or retask the most skilled workers in order to adopt a lower quality model to allow lower costs at the same price (examples: Macmillan Conns, late Holton 345s). The alternative is that production eventually ceases because the maker finds something more productive to do. That's why we no longer have Holton model 345 tubas, or Yorks, or Martins, or classic hand-made Alexanders--the costs were too high for the price buyers were willing to pay and other strategies ultimately didn't work.
Rick "noting that the best tubas in history didn't go out of production because they were bad tubas, or even because they were bad values" Denney
