Schenkelaars rotary tubas

[Estubist]

I own a Schenkelaars rotary Eb tuba. I bought it in 2018 and it plays really fine. Now i want to get more informations. There is no serial number or model name. Probably it was produced in the 1970/80ths. I read the Schenkelaars rotary tubas or parts of them were built in Germany. Some say Böhm & Meinl, which dies no longer exists, others say Meinl Weston (Melton). Does anyone knows more about that? Maybe friends of the netherlands in this forum?
I will send some Pictures soon

[jonesbrass]

Pictures will definitely help with identification and information.

[Estubist]

Photos

[UncleBeer]

Schenkelaars was an instrument factory in Eindhoven NL.

[Estubist]

Thanks. Yes I know. I'm looking for informations about their rotary tubas.

[bloke]

Wow I had no idea.
I was there in the summer of 1984 playing in a jazz festival.
Do you know if they were still in production at that time?
That’s a handsome instrument.

Schenkelaars was an instrument factory in Eindhoven NL.

[UncleBeer]

Do you know if they were still in production at that time?

Pretty sure they closed in the mid-90s, as I remember them selling off their tooling about then.

[bort2.0]

https://www.horn-u-copia.net/Reference/ ... hisrec=683

^ Adams currently owns the tooling

[hrender]

Yeah, h-u-c has several more pictures of Schenkelaars tubas, in case it helps answer the original question.

[Estubist]

Yeah, h-u-c has several more pictures of Schenkelaars tubas, in case it helps answer the original question.

I've seen this before. The tuba on the bottom of that site is like mine, I guess. But there are also no further informations.

[pjv]

I will have to see if I can confirm this, but as far as I know Schenkelaars sold stencil horns next to their own instruments. I believe their own horns were all (French style) small bore piston axes.

Your tuba might be a Cerveny stencil.

You could also write to Adams at info@adams.nl

[Estubist]

I will have to see if I can confirm this, but as far as I know Schenkelaars sold stencil horns next to their own instruments. I believe their own horns were all (French style) small bore piston axes.

Your tuba might be a Cerveny stencil.

You could also write to Adams at info@adams.nl

No, Schenkelaars Eindhoven on the Bell.
Writing to Adams is a good idea.

[pjv]

I know it's on the bell. I believe they might have only done (partial) assembly for Cerveny basses. Like I said, I'll see if I can dig something up.

[pjv]

Not that it helps much, but a comment from the late, great Klaus (imperialbari) in reference to another Schenkelaars instrument.

"The 3 of your paddles look like they could be Meinl-Weston, but your instrument very well could be a conglomerate of available at a workshop more going for playability than for looks.

Which is a bit odd maybe, as the official name to my knowledge is The Netherlands. Holland being the name for two of their provinces.

Until the upcoming of Adams the most known brass makers from The Netherlands were Kessels and Schenkelaars. The piston brasses from Schenkelaars were quite common in Denmark, when I started on brass in 1960, as currency exchange rates for US$ and British Pounds were not favorable back then. They soon lost to the British Class B instruments, which in turn lost to Yamaha’s 2XX and 3XX series.

My gallery has several entries of Schenkelaars’ instruments. The lone rotary BBb has paddles quite similar to those of your tuba. But I found no hexagonal stays. Yet I have a suspicion it is exactly on this brand I saw hexagonal stays. Could have been used for a period.

Seing the photos of the said BBb again makes me remember information told by the current MW owner, when they issued the HoJo small bore BBb models a few years back. HoJo’s original BBb tuba was a Mahillon. Making a replica wasn’t that tough for MW. They had supplied the bells for the original Mahillon version anyway.

And here may be the explanation, why your instrument looks like a conglomerate. Schenkelaars were most known for their piston instruments. They may have made their rotary instruments from parts bought from makers issuing much higher volumes of such instruments. The paddles of your tuba may look like MW, because they were bought from MW. And the rotor cranks looking like Cerveny may be because they were made by Cerveny."

So it was his personal opinion that a Schenkelaars rotary tuba was made up of their own parts plus parts from other available manufacturers. A logical assumption seeing as many manufacturers buy parts from other companies when the situation is deemed necessary.

[Estubist]

Their piston brass instruments may have been second class. Not so their rotary tubas, i guess. Anyhow mine has a bigger sound and better projektion than my 1970ths Eb Weltklang / B & S 3092.

[pjv]

I haven't read anything about their piston instruments being 2ng class.

I have seen a few comments about the mouthpieces being susceptible to red rot.

Keeping a mouthpipe well oiled is always advisable I'd thing.

[bloke]

Tuba-wise - until 1980 or so, it just seems as though (worldwide, other than the UK and one music hall in the midwestern USA) rotary was “professional” and piston was “student”.
The Swiss - along with B/M Symphonic- changed all of that, yes?

[pjv]

Ah, but then we have the French!
Viva la resistance!

[DonO.]

Tuba-wise - until 1980 or so, it just seems as though (worldwide, other than the UK and one music hall in the midwestern USA) rotary was “professional” and piston was “student”.
The Swiss - along with B/M Symphonic- changed all of that

This is EXACTLY how I remember it! I decided I wanted to major in tuba while I was in high school in the 70’s, and I used to read my band director’s copy of Instrumentalist magazine during study hall. I used to drool over the advertisements, especially those for Mirafones (that’s the way it was spelled then) and Meinl-Westons. I had never seen a horn like that in person. They seemed so different, so exotic. And these are what the professionals played. I wrote to Mirafone and they sent me a Roger Bobo solo record. He became my hero. When I started college I used a school horn, probably a big Conn if I remember right. My private instructor made it clear that I should make getting my own horn a priority. He suggested Mirafone but I could only afford used and couldn’t find one. I did find a used Meinl-Weston 25 and bought it. But there was NEVER a doubt in my mind that if I wanted to be taken seriously as a tuba player, I NEEDED a rotary valve horn! That was simply the perception back in those days. I had a tuba playing friend in high school who played a valve horn but he was taken seriously because it was a Besson. That seemed to be an exception to the perceived inferiority of pistons. By the way, never in all my years of playing tuba did I ever go over to CC. BBb was all I ever played, and I never found a situation where I thought of it as holding me back.