CC Tubas and BBb Tubas

[Jaggedwater13]

As a student majoring in Music Education, I currently own a BBb tuba. Would it be worth upgrading to a CC tuba at all? Would it be better to have an Eb/F tuba to help cover some of those higher ranges over a CC tuba? I'm stumped. Any thoughts?

[LibraryMark]

What BBb tuba do you own?

[Jaggedwater13]

What BBb tuba do you own?

I own Wessex's Luzern Tuba

[bloke]

An instrumental music education degree pursuit - typically - leads to band directing (or to changing one's major).

Non-B-flat tubas - owned/used by school bands - are statistical anomalies.
It seems to me that it would behoove a future band director (even though you previously asked about a C instrument - so I directed you to an amazing one at a fair price) to know their way around a B-flat instrument - more than any other type of tuba.

Even when equipped with only four valves, B-flat tubas cover well over 99% of the written range of the instrument - as far as ensemble music is concerned, and some B-flat tubas play below their range (as far as physics are concerned) amazingly well.

Probably the most-for-the-money B-flat tuba (as well as the most versatile) is the King model 2341 - particularly if bought used.
I have one for sale, so take my advice - in this post - with a grain of salt, completely dismiss it, and do your own research.

[russiantuba]

I don’t require my music majors to get CC tubas, I have encouraged BBb tubas for several. I do suggest to those wanting to go to graduate school for performance that they should think about learning CC tuba because many people don’t seem very open minded on that concept. I can even name a couple programs that won’t even consider you without playing CC.

[the elephant]

Tubas in C, Eb, and F are by no means necessary as a music ed. major. They just aren't. If you plan to keep playing after you are a full-time music educator there is nothing wrong at all with owning a nice King 2341.

There are no benefits to learning any of the other tubas unless you are quite serious about playing the tuba. You will never have to teach anything other than BBb, and if you own a decent one that can very happily serve you til you retire or die.

You really need to be talking about this in-depth with your tuba teacher.

[Yorkboy]

I currently own a BBb tuba. Would it be worth upgrading to a CC tuba at all?

Interesting question.

Truth be told, I’ve been contemplating selling my York 712 BBb and upgrading to a Schiller Elite CC

[York-aholic]

Truth be told, I’ve been contemplating selling my York 712 BBb and upgrading to a Schiller Elite CC

Count me first in line.

I'll even buy the Schiller Elite CC for you and trade you straight across, just to save you all of the hassle.

[bort2.0]

Play what YOU want and show THEM why it's not an issue!

[GC]

Going to CC from BBb is a change in platform, not necessarily an upgrade. There is nothing inherently superior in a CC tuba, though it does respond slightly faster than a BBb.

[matt g]

Going to CC from BBb is a change in platform, not necessarily an upgrade. There is nothing inherently superior in a CC tuba, though it does respond slightly faster than a BBb.

This is basically the gist of it.

A King 2341 or Miraphone 186 (in Bb) would be fine for most situations. If your studio teacher has hardcore ideas about your solo chops and a bass tuba is required, then the school should be providing one.

[Bob Kolada]

Learn your horn.
Learn your trade (music education).
Learn yourself, and what it takes to be a good person.
Master your trade, become a true educator. Encourage and build up your students.
Then you can master your horn.

At that point (hey, and maybe earlier) a bass tuba makes a lot of sense- brass band, brass quintet for lighter tunes, and frankly I find them more fun to play. No one's telling anyone to NOT buy tubas.

In that order.

An instrumental music education degree pursuit - typically - leads to band directing (or to changing one's major).

Non-B-flat tubas - owned/used by school bands - are statistical anomalies.
It seems to me that it would behoove a future band director (even though you previously asked about a C instrument - so I directed you to an amazing one at a fair price) to know their way around a B-flat instrument - more than any other type of tuba.

Even when equipped with only four valves, B-flat tubas cover well over 99% of the written range of the instrument - as far as ensemble music is concerned, and some B-flat tubas play below their range (as far as physics are concerned) amazingly well.

Probably the most-for-the-money B-flat tuba (as well as the most versatile) is the King model 2341 - particularly if bought used.
I have one for sale, so take my advice - in this post - with a grain of salt, completely dismiss it, and do your own research.

IMO too many people go for Music Ed thinking it will be an easier route to becoming a professional musician than to really buckle down, learn your horn inside out and upside down, learn music, pass auditions, make good music and then, ha, good luck living on a few $8k a year gigs.

Also, I've known too many music teachers that are lacking as decent humans. BE a good, helpful person. Don't be that gaggle of 25 year old band teachers who, after the community band concert is done, drop their folders off and stand in a circle BSing with each other while 60-70yo members are breaking down chairs and stands. I tolerated it too many times (and I'm a guy who's there to the end, helping the percussion guys load their timpanis), eventually had to approach them. Move your ass, help your team.

Were that to happen today, I would probably be less polite, probably get kicked out.

[bloke]

Several times, I’ve pointed out that music education degrees are “pretend performance degrees with crap added on at the end”, and/or “performance degrees lite”, as a way to ween college students off of their high school instrument and then – at the end of their degree – suddenly dump them into band directing.
I don’t see this as healthy, even though it may result in more music education graduates.
I’ve always pointed out that the degree needs to mostly turn its back on the “major instrument“ concept, and delve these students into at least 10th or 11th grade mastery level of many of the wind band brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments, as well as keyboard… but that's “hard“ isn’t it ?
(“Major instruments“ could be clung to by minoring in performance.)
Also, I would suggest that most of the “theory of learning“ type of courses be thrown in the trash, and replaced with “how to maintain discipline“ types of courses…as (can we talk?) the main purpose of grade schools is actually to watch over children while their parents go to work.
… but that’s why I’m not in charge of anything like that: because I’m stupid.

[arpthark]

As a student majoring in Music Education, I currently own a BBb tuba. Would it be worth upgrading to a CC tuba at all? Would it be better to have an Eb/F tuba to help cover some of those higher ranges over a CC tuba? I'm stumped. Any thoughts?

If you already have a good BBb tuba, moving to CC isn't an "upgrade." It's just a different key of contrabass tuba.

What does your tuba teacher say?

[Tuba1153]

I am of the firm opinion that it does not matter if you have a BBb or CC going into your freshman year of college. There are things your teacher will improve upon that apply across all keys of Tubas. Then you can have a serious discussion about horns. I did not get my "forever CC Tuba" until I was in my second semester of college and only after working my way through the trumpet Arban book. Even then, my teacher was with me when I was trying out horns and I relied on him heavily when making that decision. I still have that horn 30 years later.....along with many others. It is one of my permanent horns in my stable.

My University had 2 Mirafone 188 CC tubas that were almost exclusively reserved for the Wind Ensemble Tuba players. We would use those horns until we purchased our own horn.

[bloke]

more bluntness from blunt ol' bloke:

¹I bought my first tuba that was "open C" length when I was 17, because I was impressed with the person I was going to be studying with.
I bought the same make/model and same configuration as theirs.

Over the decades, I've owned MANY tubas of that length. Several of them STUNK, due to requiring inordinate amounts of work to play them in tune. Others (a few of them) were pretty good. The one that I've kept for a LONG time (I've lost track of how long, but the high-grade factory lacquer is now smoothly wearing off the back side of the bottom bow), plays easily in tune (compared to most of the rest that I've owned) and offers a good amount of "fist" (resonance) as opposed to quite a few tubas pitched in open-C, which tend to offer somewhat of a "hollow" resonance (being that they are basically open-B-flat designs factory-shortened to open-C.

As a senile old fart, I find myself "retreating" to B-flat instruments - at this point in my life. Oh, I have (and regularly use) instruments in all five (assuming "euphonium" is considered to be a tuba) common tuba lengths, but - comparatively suddenly - I find that I own two (not run-of-the-mill, but extraordinary) B-flat tubas, and "the better part of" yet another one (playable on gigs, but not completely "built"/completed).

It just seems to me that more B-flat tubas are naturally more resonant, and that (when they sport intonation quirks - as do all tubas) those quirks tend to be less severe. That having been said, a couple of makes of older (considered to be "ancient" by young people) American extra-large B-flat tubas offer consistently-wretched or (another make) inconsistently-wretched intonation, but some of the MOST wretched intonation is found with "ancient" (manufactured quite a few decades ago) European-made and American-made C tubas, as production was limited, and those designs had not been "trial-and-errored" enough (long pre-dating acoustical algorithm computer programs) to find best compromises in tapers.

Just as with any a-couple-feet-longer tuba, B-flat tubas are often slightly more "work" to play than (particularly if there is a sister C model to compare) C-length tubas, but there are exceptions and there are plenty of examples of selected models of B-flat tubas that are easier to negotiate than selected models of C tubas.

Just in the past few years, there has been (led by full-time professional orchestra musicians) an "American orchestra B-flat tuba reawakening", but (unlike central European players) they tend to only use them on selected works, and tend to not spend as much money on their B-flat instruments as they did their C instruments. (A player - who might currently be considered the most prominent American orchestral tuba player - uses a B-flat which - typically on resale websites - is sold used for under $4000...and I have no idea whether it was given to that person, or whether that person purchased it...but this "lower financial commitment" thing sorta indicates to me that American players are sorta just now "getting their toes RE-wetted" regarding B-flat instruments.)

There. You see? I actually got TROLLED INTO a "B-flat vs. C"...and after ALL THESE YEARS !!!
____________________________
¹ fact-checked, reference: viewtopic.php?p=50650#p50650

[sweaty]

Retired band director here. What is the cost of a decent, used, Chinese CC, EEb, or F tuba compared to the cost of college? Not much. If you have it, you can play it. If you do not have it, you cannot play it. Get all the tubas you can manage. I would not follow advice along the lines of "Well, I didn't get one until I was older, so you should, too!"

Elsewhere on this forum, I posted a video of my then-11-year-old playing the Gregson on a CC. The time to do it is when they know their scales and have a good ear. Younger people have more mental flexibility. To "encourage" him to learn CC, I locked my BBb in the car so he couldn't get at it and made him take the CC to orchestra rehearsal where he played the bass part in Mozart 41. Sink or swim, kid!

[bloke]

Nearer to the birthplace of symphony orchestras – and nearer to the birthplace of Mozart, central European orchestras will (yes) “lock out“ tuba players who show up to audition for their open tuba positions - if they show up with tubas built in C, and absolutely insist on auditioners - and hired tubaists - using B-flat tubas.

Again, I’m not selling my C instrument, but I am a reformed (and I think I hid it pretty well) American C tuba snob. In the past, I would say that “it’s how good the instrument is and not so much what length its open bugle is”, but I’m not sure I believed it. I now see it, believe it, and embrace it. I now tend to suspect that the “C tuba for college“ thing is just as much a gimmick is the “F-attachment for upper middle school“ trombone gimmick and “wood clarinet“ as well (ie. hand-in-hand music store/studio teacher upselling).

[Sousaswag]

5th grade band director here…

I have two nice tubas. One C and one F. As the year has progressed, I rarely use either with the kids. One, it’s just a hassle for me to take it to and from several different schools when only one of them has a tuba player. (I walked into the program, didn’t do the recruiting, etc.) Two, it doesn’t help to play tuba with a group of sax players.

It’s MUCH more beneficial for kids to learn with their instrument being modeled rather than some tuba.

Do I need either of these instruments in my career path? No. I don’t. But neither of them causes me any debt or trouble so I don’t have a reason not to keep them.

I DO play both of them with two groups regularly.

You don’t need a C tuba to be a music Ed major… everything bloke said earlier is spot on about the degree path… I’m going to echo what everyone else said and say that you should get better at the tuba rather than worry about expensive equipment.

If you don’t put yourself into financial hardship, then buy a C if you want. (I’d probably recommend a good Eb but that’s neither here nor there)… Otherwise, you can do everything you need on a Bb instrument.

[bloke]

Last subscription concert - I played my F tuba on Capriccio Espagnol, because I was looking for a little bit more "teeth" (and less "weight") in the repeated low A's (along with repeated B-flats, and everything else as well. My squatty Holton B-flat could have accomplished this, but I was already carrying two instruments, and the stage (in that venue) is compact.

https://s9.imslp.org/files/imglnks/usim ... wBrass.pdf

I also used the F tuba on Massenet's "Le Cid" (quite a bit of the opera's music, not just an overture or just a couple of the scenes' excerpts), as it was originally written for the 6-piston euphonium-sized 8-foot-C-length (with an oversize bore) "French tuba" - so I also was looking for less weight and more punch.

Finally, the concert ended with Mexican composer, Arturo Márquez' Danzón No.2. This piece would sound just fine on a B-flat sousaphone, but - rather than that - I played it on a very large B-flat tuba.

a fine performance of this work found on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjZPHW0qVvo

again: My C instrument is collecting a bit of dust.

The E-flat (finally ) will be dusted off for yet another country club brunch engagement in very early October. (I really miss playing that thing.)

➜...but band students play B-flat tubas (only) and band directors teach B-flat tuba (only).