clarity-of-sound vs. umbrella-bass

[tubanh84]

Their Mahler 6 is incredible in general. And it has the solos in the 4th mvt so you can hear just how clear that BBb can be.

Not sure if this is the horn in question, but it sounds good. Some tutti stuff at the 15:50 mark.

Same horn, different recording.

https://youtu.be/25tSq_dYL3c?t=3440

[MikeMason]

Cutting through the orchestra is not always something the employers value. Blend and support seem to be highly valued.

[bloke]

This is slightly off-topic - and even a bit off-topic as a response to the most recent response...but here it is, anyway:

I play in three different orchestras, and one of the orchestras has an Irish conductor who studied in Hungary.
This doesn’t pertain to the tuba or the size of a tuba or the sonic characteristics of a tuba, but before people “got it”, He was always telling people - who were overinterpreting pianissimo - that if they were going to play that soft, that indistinctly, and that indiscernibly, that they might as well not play.

ie.
“I’m seeing your part down here on this staff, but I’m not hearing it being played.”

more to the topic:
Those rare/sometimes-the-orchestra-as-a-whole-is-a-bit-sloppy recordings of Roger Bobo playing under Mehta: The CLEAR/distinguishable sound of him playing a 184/186/188/whatever..THAT'S how a tuba (to me) should sound in an orchestra. An English horn can play soft, loud, or mezzo-loud/soft as a part of a woodwind chord - or playing a solo line, but the English horn's sonority is always distinguishable...and EVEN THOUGH I might end up with a large-belled tuba again - sometime in the future (??), I still categorize most of them as "best built as B-flat instruments, and used to mimic the resonance of string basses - when wind bands are performing transcriptions of orchestral works, traditional marches, and quite a few other types of wind band compositions.
Further (and this is redundant), I always discover how very hard I had been working (to achieve a semblance of clarity when launching sound-events) when I immediately move from most "6/4" tubas to most "normal-sized" tubas.

...and this - as well - is redundant:



a final thought:
More often, I've caught myself over-playing 6/4 tubas (as attempts to achieve clarity of sound) than smaller-sized tubas.

[tubanh84]

Cutting through the orchestra is not always something the employers value. Blend and support seem to be highly valued.

I should clarify that I’m comparing watching someone put effort into a part while not being able to hear it vs that effort contributing something to the overall sound of the group. I don’t mean that it should be abrasive or somehow be the most prominent voice. Though sometimes it should be.

Joe said it better right above here. And those LA recording with Bobo have been in my head while I’ve been responding to this thread.

[jtm]

Is there any other wind instrument that can differ as much in size, shape, and characteristic sound (even for the same instrument pitch) as tubas?

Baritones and euphoniums get different names. Flugelhorns aren't called 6/4 cornets. Clarinets (in the same key) are all basically the same size and shape, with a similar sound.

How did tubas get so lucky?

[Three Valves]

Today at practice it was evident that the Bach12=clarity and the TU25=umbrella.

[cjk]

Rudy 5/4 BBb -- clarity or umbrella?

All bass, no treble. You’ll have to put some edge or zip into the sound on purpose.

[bloke]

When any of you visit here, you have to try out the 98. It’s really quite amazing, and hard to describe.

[DonO.]

Is there any other wind instrument that can differ as much in size, shape, and characteristic sound (even for the same instrument pitch) as tubas?

Baritones and euphoniums get different names. Flugelhorns aren't called 6/4 cornets. Clarinets (in the same key) are all basically the same size and shape, with a similar sound.

How did tubas get so lucky?

I think the answer to this question has to do with the history of orchestra instrumentation as well as the history of the tuba. Orchestras in the Classical period had only trumpets and horns for brass. Beethoven was the first composer of note to use trombones. For bass lip reed instruments we had serpents and their variants. Then a slew of instrument designers/inventors decided there should be a better brass bass voice. So we had ophicleides, saxhorns, and such. Along with the invention of the first recognizable rotary valve operated tuba by Cerveny. Composers in the 1800’s who wanted a bass brass voice often wrote “Corno im basso” in the score, literally “bass horn”, because they couldn’t keep up with all the variants. This often got shortened to “cimbasso”. Different composers viewed the use of tuba in orchestra different ways. Is it part of the brass choir? Is it to support other bass instruments? Can it switch roles in the middle of the piece? I think this initial confusion about whether there should be a tuba in an orchestral piece, and, if there is, what role should it play in the grand scheme of things, resulted in the plethora of designs, sizes, keys, etc. that we see today. Not to mention bands of various types having a different set of requirements.

[bloke]

I enjoyed reading Don‘s post, just immediately preceding this one. I enjoy reading concise reviews of what has occurred, which are both concise and accurate.

To retreat to discussing the mechanics of the wide sound versus the narrow sound, I believe that the wide sound defines that it is more difficult to ascertain exactly when it begins. For decades, the gentleman in the Chicago Symphony was just about the only person in the world who played an instrument in an orchestra as wide-sounding as was his – basically a large “band” tuba which was factory shortened to C.
Some people have made light/nonmalicious fun of the style that he employed when using that instrument, which was basically to attack a lot of sounds with a slight forte piano. What he was doing allowed for that wide sound to become more defined, and – even if slightly overdone – I believe that those who play instruments such as that (who don’t - at least - do a little bit of what he did) are risking that their sound is not defined well enough to be understood and interpreted by the patrons.

[Doc]

I enjoyed reading Don‘s post, just immediately preceding this one. I enjoy reading concise reviews of what has occurred, which are both concise and accurate.

To retreat to discussing the mechanics of the wide sound versus the narrow sound, I believe that the wide sound defines that it is more difficult to ascertain exactly when it begins. For decades, the gentleman in the Chicago Symphony was just about the only person in the world who played an instrument in an orchestra as wide-sounding as was his – basically a large “band” tuba which was factory shortened to C.
Some people have made light/nonmalicious fun of the style that he employed when using that instrument, which was basically to attack a lot of sounds with a slight forte piano. What he was doing allowed for that wide sound to become more defined, and – even if slightly overdone – I believe that those who play instruments such as that (who don’t - at least - do a little bit of what he did) are risking that their sound is not defined well enough to be understood and interpreted by the patrons.

I seem to remember the current gentleman in the Chicago Symphony saying that acoustics of Orchestra Hall demands a bit of a ping on the front of the note for the tuba. I wonder if that requirement seems as necessary when he plays his smaller instruments? Either way, I'm a fan of both of those gentlemen.