Re: Re: CC vs. F help!


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Posted by Klaus is spot-on, IMO on October 10, 2001 at 17:34:22:

In Reply to: Re: CC vs. F help! posted by Klaus on October 10, 2001 at 14:24:27:

If you go for a large F as your only tuba, then for playing parts written with contrabass tuba in mind, you'll be spending a lot of time in the very low end of your tuba's range, where lots of valves will have to be used together. This can be very tiring on your right hand, and the tuba may be less responsive and more work to play in this range. But it would be great for quintet use.

Personal experience details (skip this if you don't like long posts)--

I used to play BBb exclusively. I switched to Eb exclusively as my only playing (at that time) was quintet, and Eb made the upper register playing a little easier. Later on, I discovered that using a compensating Eb in pit orchestra whilst playing extended low register passages (between the low BBb and the pedal EEb) was for me rather unpleasant.

I do think that a large, non-compensating, rotary Eb tuba (if a good one existed) would be the best possible, single compromise tuba. However, since I need both a smaller, lighter sound in my quartet; and a larger, fuller sound in larger groups, I finally decided on the two-tuba approach. For me, this will be F and BBb most likely. (F tuba in my posession, BBb tuba on order).

Steve Inman
Kokomo, IN


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