Re: 1934 Conn bass instruments brochure


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Posted by Rick Denney on March 20, 2003 at 02:32:52:

In Reply to: 1934 Conn bass instruments brochure posted by Klaus on March 19, 2003 at 21:22:32:

Very interesting. I've printed it out and put it with my copy of the old York catalog.

Are we just missing the pages that show the upright bells? Was the 24J not yet offered? Where was the upright-belled 36J? They made reference to it, but didn't show it.

To me, the most interesting part was the testimonial section. Did all of these players actually play the Conn BAT's? If so, then many of the major orchestras had tuba players who at least sometimes used a grand orchestral tuba in the middle 1930's. Donitelli was one of them--maybe he liked the Conn better than the York which he had sold to Jacobs are year or two earlier (if I'm remembering my dates). The catalop explicitly says that the endorsements were unpaid, but there are other ways to compensate endorsers.

The picture above (from a current auction that has gone beyond my acceptable price) shows another endorsement of an instrument that wasn't frequently used by the endorser. But it, along with his inspiration, were certainly in the style of the big Conns, when compared with the 4/4 rotaries used by others. Perhaps Jacobs was not establishing a new trend as much as we thought.

Rick "wondering who really did play what and when" Denney


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