Me & My Tuba, Add You & Yours

[jeopardymaster]

Nice Alex, Terry. Looks like your bell might flare just a bit more than mine or else starts later, but that might be an optical illusion. My bell finishes off at just a shade under 16.5 inches.

[butch]

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My wee girls inside my sousaphone bell when she was about two months.

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Me playing children songs for my wee girl, now 19 months. She enjoys the music. She calles my instrument «buba» and she exactly knows where the mouthpiece belongs to and how to press the valves.

I think I gonna bring her close to low brass as early as possible.

And yes she's wearing a KISS-T-shirt! Just because I liked it!

[bigbob]

Here's a pic of me and the Gnagey!I'm still trying to get used to it...Soooo many different combinations with the addition of the 5valve(rotor)...I'm getting some fantastic low notes that I didn't seem to do with the 3J...by the way the bell is 19 1/2".....Someday maybe I'll get up the courage to play with a group untill then I'm just going to keep on learning!......BB

[AndyCat]

Myself and my Yamaha Neo BBb at an Intrada Brass CD recording session.

IntradaRecording.jpg

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[jorgeskid]

The Yamaha is absolute crap.

Sell it to me.

Noel, regarding my "crap" comment:

A lot of people do not understand why a lot of owners of this particular tuba complain about the ergonomics.

So your post will allow me to explain about the main complaints that I have read and that line up with my own.

1. Valve angle...

The valve positioning is terrible on these tubas, making the pinky bend so that it is *inside* where the index finger is when the horn is held at the proper angle. So your wrist is bend downwards at a 55º to 60º angle if you hold it one common way or close to 45º if you hold it in what seems to be the other popular way for this tuba. Either way is very bad for things like CTS or arthritis; very sharp pains are the result.

My moving the thumb ring more than an inch "north" on the slide tube and then reshaping the lever to fit relieved a lot of stress on my wrist by opening up the claw-like finger position Yamaha saw fit to require of the player, allowing my arm to fall into a slightly different position and thereby removing the pain in my pinky-to-wrist tendon.

2. first slide...

The first slide is awkward to manipulate while holding the tuba. I added a pull ring to the 1st slide that puts my left hand in what at first seemed to be an odd place, but Yamaha did not design in a place for your left hand, so moving the 1st slide was always pretty awkward, anyway. I simply made it reachable from a location that was easier to maintain for long stretches of time.

3. Leadpipe height...

I moved the leadpipe up about 4" to remove a good bit of the painful "hunchback" that a tall player must maintain to get way down the the mouthpiece (as placed by Yamaha). Doing this required me to add about 3" of length to the leadpipe with a small angled piece at the end to allow the pipe to come up at a slightly sharper angle, which gave it another inch of distance from the bottom bow. It is not tall enough for me, but it is tall enough for most. It is much more comfortable. This also made my very sharp horn much more manageable. Many of these must be played with the main slide almost all the way out. (Maybe they had a 440 and 442 versions at the same time and did not send them to the correct markets? I have always wondered about this. The sharp ones are shorter than the ones that were obviously cut for A=440 - I have measured five of these horns besides my own, so two that were in tune with the main out an inch or so and four that needed the main out about four inches or more. Adding length to my main slide allows me to play this tuba in tune with my slide out about one inch. Prior to this leadpipe mod I had the main slide out so far that it would be pushed in by the top of my right leg as I played. So this is *much* better.

4. Overall tone...

These tubas are über bland in tone. Everyone *loves* them except for tuba players. I played an Alex 163 and wanted a tone more like that from my Yamaha. I used many mouthpieces over the years until I stumbled across the Laskey 30F, which helps me to generate more of the overtones that seem to add roundness and color to the sound. So now the tone is not so frustrating and the occasional characteristic-yet-unexpected "bark" these horns sometimes emit has gone away completely.

This mouthpiece and these three mods have turned this into a longterm keeper for me. I have owned it for over 12 years now and have no intention of selling it unless I come across an awfully good F tuba and have the money for it on hand.

So no. I will not sell it. It is MINE! MUWAHAHAHAAAAA!!!

I adore my 621, I think it sounds fantastic! Quite big for such a little tuba.

I too thought it was uncomfortable at first, so I went out and bought a tupperware box and covered it in shelf liner. It fixed the height problem, while tipping the horn a bit to the left while on the box made it much more comfortable on my hand. All in all, it cost me about 10 bucks

[Tubajug]

Here's a photo of my and my babies:



And just one of me. Maybe it's the camera angle, but I decided that I look weird when I play the tuba...

[eupher61]

not included in here are my wife's bassoon, flute, clarinet, another banjo, stepdaughter's keyboard and guitar, my snoot flute, and a borrowed oboe.

From left, more or less in order, Amati BBb helicon (1970s?), Kay M1B bass (1955), glass washboard c. 1943, Benge 165F trombone, Bacon and Day Montana Silver Bell Model 1 tenor banjo, Cerveny F helicon modified by Dan Schultz (c. 1900?), Martin Mammoth (1957) on a Tuba Tamer, Slingerland MayBell plectrum banjo (c.1929), B&S PT-10 (1984) Schiller 3v comp baritone (2012), Conn Eb 3v (1919, IIRC), Schiller 4v comp euphonium (2012).
BBC tuba rest, Belmonte tuba stand, Belmonte music stand, Tama throne. Bass is on a Hercules bass stand.
Top shelf: Balu Large walnut mute, H&B small tuba mute, Samick uke, Yamaha silent brass, recording bell for Martin. Gig bags include Cronkhite, Gard, Altieri, and Cerveny cover.

It's nice to finally have enough room that all of these can be in one area and easily accessed to play.

[bearphonium]

Not exactly me...

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[Kayla]

Me and my MW 2250

[opus37]

My current collection. Kanstul 66T, Holton Eb Helicon (1921), and Martin Monster Eb (1912).

[bort]

Me and my MW 2250

Did you know someone was taking that picture?

[hbcrandy]

Here are some images of me and the the tuba phases through which I passed in my laters years.

IMG_1305_Brass_Quintet Cropped 1200.JPG

HBC group IMG_11088-round_crop,blueBG,sm.jpg

HSO Trombones and Tuba.jpg

Well, there goes my 15 minutes of fame.

[Heavy_Metal]

Hey, you forgot a pic of you conducting TubaChristmas!

[hbcrandy]

Hey, you forgot a pic of you conducting TubaChristmas!

Frank:

We don't want to scare our tubenet friends.

[Kayla]

Me and my MW 2250

Did you know someone was taking that picture?

No idea, my friend snapped this right before I started playing, and he showed me after the recital. I like it

[Heavy_Metal]

Hey, you forgot a pic of you conducting TubaChristmas!

Frank:

We don't want to scare our tubenet friends.

Yeah, you're right- never thought about that, but I don't scare that easily

[antny2272]

The Seed and Feed Marching Abominable Sousa's

[antny2272]

gigin barely fit in the club

[antny2272]

1925 king jumbo

[imperialbari]

1925 king jumbo

I notice that Bill bombed this photo also.