Best posts made by barliman2001

@dr-go Thank you very much, Doc.

@tjcombo said in A little humour:

thanks for editing!

And one more clip of the weird and rare...

@bigdub for some reason? She had money. Lots of. Even bought - yes, bought! - Carnegie Hall for a concert...

@administrator Thanks.
I've already conducted my first lesson in hospital - one of the nurses inherited a trumpet from an uncle (a rather decrepit but still functional Cerveny) and now wants to learn. Thanks to the good advice in Ivan Hunter's booklet Trumpeting 4 Fun (which, by the way, I am translating into German just now for publication sometime after Easter) she played her first note after only three minutes...

In Bavaria, unwary tourists can fall prey to the Wolperdinger, a vicious flesh-eating hare with a roebuck's horns. These horns carry a strong venom which, however, is only dangerous to non-Bavarians. If touched by these horns, these individuals generally develop "Prussian disease" manifesting itself in trying to copy Bavarians in dress and language, making themselves abominably ridiculous.
One of the finest drawings of an actual Wolperdinger was done in 1503 by Albrecht Dürer. https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolpertinger#/media/Datei:Wolpertinger.jpg
Once the venomous horns have rendered the victim without the will to resist, the Wolperdinger can do serious damage with his protruding fangs. The creature is the more dangerous as it has wings and is able to fly short distances, often perching on branches and dropping on unsuspecting travellers.

IMHO, most Martin Committees are way overpriced due to demand from players who want one even if their playing capabilities don't warrant such an investment...
I don't deny that there are wonderful instruments amongst those remaining with us; but it is a fact (as with all instruments) that there are some played-outs and duds amongst them and what's even more important, an instrument needs to be suited to a player's charactristics and typical repertoire. You would not play a Mozart Mass on a Committee, just the same as you would have your work cut out playing swing solos on a Selmer piccolo.
So, as with all instruments, only buy "into the dark" if you cannot really miss due to proven quality, known fittingness of instrument or good price.
I have several times bought "into the dark" because something seemed desirable at the time... with the result that afterwards, I either could not get to grips with the instrument, or it had some hidden defect, or it failed to fit a need I had. Result?
Neither of these instruments is with me now.
I'll explain:
As a relatively inexperienced players, I had a lot of recordings of music for the corno da caccia - and I had money to burn. So, when on a business trip to Leipzig, I casually wandered into Friedbert Syhre's workshdp because there was a beautiful silver-plated corno in the window, and bought it for cash (a whopping € 4,000). I practised on it once a week, perhaps, for about five years, never played a single gig with it, and then sold it to a guy who really could use it, for half the price.
A couple of years later, I found a Clemens Glier Kuhlohorn on e-bay; really wanted it as a rotary flugelhorn to complement my piston Courtois. Bid on it till the cows came home, got it, used it for about ten rehearsals and two gigs and then found that as a flugelhorn, it was unsatisfactory compared to my Courtois, and sold it on to a player in Vermont who can really use it in church music.

At one time, I was so completely kitted out that I virtually had a trumpet for every possible pitch (A, Bb, C, D, E - for Hummel Original [which I never played] - Eb, G). The only thing I lacked was a trumpet in F. So I, young fool that I was, ordered one from Vinceent Bach, silver plated. Took about six months to get to me; played beautifully; but then, again, I was lacking opportunities of using it. So after a year, I re-sold it at half price.
One more instance: I had a beautiful Besson Kanstul Bb/A picc that I really liked and which I sounded nice on. But I was dead set on having a Stomvi picc, due to the Maurice André connection, and sold the Besson Kanstul for a Stomvi Elite. Nice horn; but the valve block was built a bit lighter than the Besson, and it did not fit my hand so nicely which forced me to exert too much pressure on the valve block with the result that valve #1 regularly got stuck... something I had never experienced with the Besson I am using in this pic...

I'll continue with my success stories...
Found an oldish, almost worn-out Courtois Balanced Bb at Votruba's in Vienna for a price tag of € 300, had it refurbed for another € 150 and been playing it successfully in symphonic settings ever since all over Europe...
About a year later, in 2018, Votruba's called me to see a nice horn that just had come into their shop out of a trumpet player's estate... turned out to be a nicely preserved Olds Recording, for a mere € 450... has been my main big band axe ever since...

Hope you can make some sense out of my rambling!

Bit of talking at the beginning, about how seriously they take music... and then...

@dr-go Only just this thread which is highly interesting to me, seeing that I'm to be released from hospital tomorrow after two weeks of treatment for pneumonia... but as regards the tin woodwinds, I think that their higher mortality rate is just due to sax and violins...

@SSmith1226 Steve, you forgot one: My wife says I've only got two faults - My forgetfulness and something else.

@Dr-GO Over here in Austria, Easter services tend to be a) Catholic and b) orchestral masses. For this coming Easter Sunday, I'm booked into St. Peter's in Vienna for Schubert Mass No. 3 in Bb, St. Mary Magdalene for Mozart Organ Solo, and for Easter Monday it's Otto Nicolai Mass in D, with Caspar Ett's Haec Dies" thrown in for good measure (which is for trumpet in Ab!!)

Several reasons come to mind...

1. Many professionals have been contracted as Signature Artists - they get paid (sometimes huge sums) to play on a certain manufacturer's horns, and endorse them. Their personal horns are then crafted to whatever specification they prefer. So it may well be that some professionals are playing Committee clones - we just don't know.
2. Many professionals in the past were playing Committees - when they were still being manufactured and readily available Nowadays, full professionals - whose livelihood depends on being able to perform very full schedules - would probably shy away from using an instrument that could not, in case of accident, be readily replaced. There are myriad stories around of professionals' horns getting lost in transit or being mislaid on airports, or being severely damaged by luggage staff (remember Dave Carroll of Sons of Maxwell fame whose valuable guitar was damaged by United Airlines staff, inspiring him to write an appropriate song...
   and several sequels...

@dr-go Regular spitballs are stored in an alcoholic cleaning liquid that can do the job as well, if you use three or four new spitballs each time.

@Trumpetsplus So far, in 32 years of trumpet playing so far, having gone through more than 150 instruments (current count is 38), most of them vintage, I have never felt the need to change valve stems... and I don't know a single player who ever did that (except in cases of horns with parts missing, so-called "lamp horns")

@BigDub I once had a spate of piccs... starting off with an old Selmer, then changing to a Besson Kanstul, then adding a Stomvi Elite, then a Votruba Pro... another, younger Selmer... and then I happened upon a Scherzer high G. And that one very soon told me that for me and my kind of playing, A/Bb picc was simply wasted effort. All the Baroque pieces that I was playing on A picc suddenly became much more manageable when I switched to the Scherzer high G... no more sharps anywhere... and then I got my claws on an old Selmer high G out of the estate of Maurice André... and that was one revelation. It beat the Scherzer and all the other piccs by such a margin that I sold every single one of them.

A guy has massive problems with bed-wetting at night. He's been through several courses of medication - no solution. Finally, he's sent to a psychotherapist. A few days later, he meets an old friend who is surprised to find his bed-wetting friend not despondent, but radiant. "Why are you looking so happy?" he asks. "It's because of that psychotherapist." the other one explains. - "It really worked?" - "No, but now I'm enjoying it!"

@Kehaulani said in Boorish Band Behavior:

I{f it bothers you, take it up with the conductor or band president.
And FWIW, I feel the sexist description and comments uncalled for and tasteless.

I can see no sexist description - rather a polite euphemism in describing the culprit not as a "fat woman" but as a "generously proportioned lady".

@BigDub It's the high G FOR ME. Other players may have other needs. But for my kind of playing, it's perfect. And it's slightly easier to control than a full picc.

All the best for our recovery!
Having recently suffered a minor stroke, I know what it is to lie around in hospitals... a good cure during rehab was seeing all those other patients who had been hit far harder than me.

From day one, I had my pocket trumpet with me to practise; unfortunately without a mute. I then ordered Thomann's own brand warm-up mute which did the job. Nice, small, and well intonated, it surprised me as being better than the Wick... can only recommend it.
As to sound reduction: Quite a few nurses encouraged me to play, seeing my horn. And were very astonished when I told them that I was working on Arban up to two hours per day. No one outside my room had noticed...

https://www.thomann.de/gb/thomann_compact_warmup_trumpet_mute.htm

@Comeback Don't worry - three trumpets an two cornets is only the Stage 1 of N+1 Disease (N being the number of instruments you have..). When you're in my shoes, with 29 trumpets and cornets, two trombones and two euphonia, you get to realize that cleaning is thoroughly overrated...