Me & My Tuba, Add You & Yours

[Mike C855B]

Thanks for the welcome, Pete (and Mark), and nice meeting you. I found the forum searching for BBb/CC comparisons; and now know I have too few orchestra opportunities to rationalize a CC.

Growing up in Southern California in the '60s I'm only very recently discovering that my school years were spent in the shadow of tuba greats the likes of Roger Bobo (of course), Tommy Johnson and Gene Pokorny. I knew of Roger and heard him with LASO a few times, but never met any of them that I recall, although I may have very well played alongside Gene at some event - particularly a massed tuba performance at USC.

I have regrets about not majoring in tuba or even music for that matter, but the computer engineering career kept food on the table, something that was not looking especially good for a tuba performance major at the time. Managed to get a couple of studio gigs in the '70s through connections, but life got in the way and the horn went silent for a few years.

[Mark E. Chachich]

I left professional music many years ago for neuroscience because a steady check was necessary. My music degree and what it gave to me was the foundation to get a Ph.D. and work as a research neuropathologist at the NIH and then become a professor at Towson University. My point, music is important! Do not have regrets, be thankful that you are a musician. Again, welcome to TubeNet!

Mark

[Art Hovey]

This is my Yorkophone, as seen by Terry Wild just last month. He's a good friend with a good camera and he knows how to use it.
It's been a couple of years since I last polished it, but he somehow made it look shiny.

[jperry1466]

I'll jump in here just because. Two pics, the first is two great tuba players with me, the wannabe. This was 1974 in Rex Conner's studio at Kentucky with our Getzen Meinl-Westons. My buddy Dave, on the left was a phenomenal player, one of those freaks who didn't have to practice much and still played rings around me while I practiced 4-6 hours a day. He died some years back of a lung disorder, of all things, so I am the lone surviving member of this pic. The second pic is yours truly 44 years later with my new Mack Brass CC. As you can see, I've been down a lot of roads and most of them weren't paved.

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[MN_TimTuba]

With my 1966 Holton 345 BBb, just after it's return from Eric Peterson repairs.

[MartyNeilan]

Marty Neilan and the tuba formerly known as BART at The Village Tinker aka Dan Schultz, after Dan did some work on it - put a garland on the 100 yr old cracking bell that he got off a recording bell Mirafone, completed the 5th valve assembly including "work of art" linkage and slide extensions, pulled dents in the outer bows without removing the nickel-silver guards, and overall cleaned up my good attempt but sloppy execution. After numerous trials and rebuilds in my kitchen or garage (depending on where I lived) this tuba is now as close to being "finished" as it will ever be.
Mouthpiece is the infamous Warburton-Neilan loosely based on the original helleberg style Jacobs mouthpiece with a C4 style rim in a heavyweight brass configuration and produces a nice round sound. The G&W Baer F also seems to work well on this tuba in providing a contrasting sound that is still fat but a little brighter and tighter. I have also used the Baer CC which splits the difference; the Baer Beltane proved too shallow for this contrabass and has since been sold.

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For comparison, this is what it looked like when I first purchased it in 2010. The MW "small piston" valveset was grafted in a couple years later.

[jperry1466]

I studied with Rex at Interlochen that summer. Everyone loved him. On the bulletin board of the cafeteria was some sort of flier with a pen-and-ink owl on it. Someone wrote (in very small print) Rex.

That pic has a double meaning, at least to me. He did have kind of an owlish look with his hair and glasses, and he was good natured and could take a joke on himself. He was also full of wisdom. As you know, his teaching method was kind of subtle but very effective. He also had a big heart. Because we were poor college kids who also held jobs, my wife and I could not go home to Texas for summer or holidays from Jan. to Dec. of 1973. Rex and Alberta invited us to their house for Thanksgiving, and we visited in their home a number of times. On several of those occasions, he would make me go with him on the front porch so he could have a cigarette, even in freezing weather, since Alberta wouldn't let him smoke in the house. He told me once that he had been injured in a car wreck when he was young, and half his lower lip was permanently numb. Amazing man, teacher, and friend.

[Jerryleejr]

Guess I never updated mine when I got the new horn.

JJ