Re: Re: Re: guess the tuba


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Posted by Jay Bertolet on September 27, 2001 at 12:32:01:

In Reply to: Re: Re: guess the tuba posted by bruce h on September 27, 2001 at 10:46:18:

What constitutes a BAT (as near as I can tell) depends on the player. It also has, in my opinion, nothing to do with the amount of projected sound. If I had to come up with (off the top of my head) a reasonable guideline for establishing BATiness, I would define it as a horn that requires a specifically different playing approach than the standard 4/4 tuba approach. What I mean by that is the 4/4 tuba is a pretty straight forward proposition. You blow into it, if you blow harder you get a louder sound (assuming you're doing things right), and then you spend the next few years learning how to control larger and larger amounts of air (and resultant sound) until you find the quality and projected level of sound you're after as well as the limits that the particular tuba you're playing has. BATs require a totally different approach. If you try to overpower a BAT, it doesn't project well, it doesn't sound good, and it will give you intonation problems. With a BAT, you learn how to really refine your approach and put as clean and clear a signal into the mouthpiece as possible. Then you sit back and let those big sections of tubing do the work of projecting the sound. Also, the quality of the two sounds is very different. For my taste, the definitions we've discussed in the past work pretty well. 4/4 tubas tend to be more directional, as in a cutting (more laser beam) type of sound. BAT sounds tend to be more wide and enveloping, the type of sound you can really feel even if you can't exactly pick it out from the overall ensemble sound. Of course, which horns do these things for each individual player is a matter of conjecture. These are just my perceptions based on my playing techniques and philosophy. For me and my playing, Miraphone doesn't make a BAT. You may be different. The closest I ever saw to a Miraphone BAT was the old 190. It didn't miss BAT status by much, I thought.

Boy, isn't that the cheesiest post I've ever made to this board???

My opinion for what it's worth...


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