Posted by Steve Marcus on March 10, 2004 at 12:36:38:
In Reply to: Re: Tuba Store of your Dreams posted by Sean Chisham on March 10, 2004 at 11:20:24:
Sean:
As one who manages a Steinway Piano showroom, I think that you have some very fine ideas about tuba showroom features.
I haven’t physically visited some of the better known/respected tuba stores (e.g. Baltimore Brass, Custom Music, Low Brass Werks, etc.), but WW&BW does meet at least some of your criteria:
“The ultimate tuba store for me would have silent rooms of various sizes...”
You can take tubas from WW&BW’s main tuba showroom into their Wenger practice rooms. These have the built-in ambient sound systems with hidden microphones and speakers in the walls so that you can simulate different acoustic environments.
“These audition rooms would come equipped with easy to use recording and playback equipment with microphones placed in several different places. Each mike would have its own recording track. The controls would be remote control and sit next to the person trying out the horns.”
If the Wenger rooms don’t already offer the inputs/outputs from their built-in electronics, it seems that they could be fairly easily retrofitted to accommodate your suggestion. If the showroom doesn’t have its own recording equipment on site, at least the input/output jacks could be accessible for those bringing their own portable recording equipment.
“On the stand or nearby would be a well organized collection of sheet music and etude books which could be used in the evaluation of the horn.”
We do keep the standard piano repertoire available for customers to play in our showroom: Beethoven sonatas, Chopin nocturnes, etc. However, when trying different instruments, there is something to be said for playing the same piece with which you are already familiar, rather than browsing through someone else’s sheet music selections.
“Also near at hand would be a collection of all the production mouthpieces currently on the market in all their variants to help in the equipment decision.”
I think that all the major tuba showrooms offer that.
”The room would also have a tuner and metronome click track for the evaluator.”
Yes, but it’s not too much trouble to bring one of these small devices yourself, especially considering that you may be more familiar with the sensitivity of your own tuner as opposed to one that you’ve not used before.
“The person trying the instruments could also be given a compact disc burned with the results of the evaluation so the musician could take it home, play it for others, and take her time in the decision of which instrument to purchase.”
Great idea.