E flat tenor horns

[bloke]

There's sort of eccentric guy who lives in Oxford, Mississippi (where Ole Miss is) is mostly a woodwind player, and only has a bicycle (whereby other people have to bring his repairs to me) just brought me a second set of three E-flat tenor horns (it's been years since he sent the last set up here) to repair.
One is probably the last one that Conn ever made in the 60s, one is an older Conn, and one is an entry level satin silver B&H Regent (which I sort of think is the best player). As one might expect, the two Conns are bell front and the Regent is bell up.

Before I find someone to hand them off to to get them back to him, if anyone's interested in seeing pictures of them repaired, I'll post a few. Otherwise, not.

[bloke]

best guesses at to age:

(left to right)

- 40's Conn
- 60's Conn
- 60's B&H Regent

Conn's have removable extensions to shorten from E-flat to F.

[arpthark]

I have one of the middle Conns, 1960s. Mine is satin silver with a gold wash bell. Missing a valve stem and finger button, kind of gave up the search for a matching button after a while.

Kind of an unusual instrument to amass and kind of obsolete unless you’re in a British style brass band. Does he play them…?

[bloke]

I have one of the middle Conns, 1960s. Mine is satin silver with a gold wash bell. Missing a valve stem and finger button, kind of gave up the search for a matching button after a while.

Kind of an unusual instrument to amass and kind of obsolete unless you’re in a British style brass band. Does he play them…?

I think he's mostly a woodwind player and he seems to know a lot of professional musicians around the country. I know he got into the E-flat alto horn thing a while back. I'm not sure why. I suspect he owns between 6 and 10 of these things. He only rides a bicycle and I believe he has a bunch of those as well.

Interesting person. I believe he used to be on the staff of Mr Rogers' Neighborhood television program.

[prodigal]

My school might have a couple of these sitting around in the old "junk" locker, but I'm not sure if they're alto or tenor horns. Definitely period pieces.

[bloke]

My school might have a couple of these sitting around in the old "junk" locker, but I'm not sure if they're alto or tenor horns. Definitely period pieces.

It's a bit confusing, because alto and tenor are used interchangeably when discussing E-flat instruments of this nature.
(It took me a couple of months sometime in the last year or two to realize this, as I had never paid much attention to this particular nomenclature.)

For something to be B-flat, it will be labeled a baritone (whether skinny or medium sized, and excluding all of the old patented names such as "trombonium" and all those sorts of names - all of those skinny little B-flat instruments made by Conn, King, Olds, Reynolds, etc... those were actually just real skinny baritones - very much the size of English baritones). The reason that they all invented names for those is because all of those companies were making near euphonium-sized instruments and calling those things "baritones".

[prodigal]

Ok, so my son's Olds Ambassador bell-front is basically a "baritone?"

What size mouthpiece do these Eb tenor horns use?

[claf]

I have a Besson New Standard that I sometimes use.
It's taking a trumpet-shank mouthpiece, but slightly larger (I use a 19 mm, while my trumpet mouthpieces are 16.9/17 mm) and deeper (flugelhorn-style).

[arpthark]

Ok, so my son's Olds Ambassador bell-front is basically a "baritone?"

What size mouthpiece do these Eb tenor horns use?

Something deep-ish and funnel shaped about halfway between a trumpet and a baritone mouthpiece. I have a little "Wick 3" that is nice.

I have a few alto horns -- the Conn I mentioned, and an Austrian no-name alto horn in F painted in gold lacquer that's been through the ringer.

[bloke]

I thought he was asking about mouthpieces for the B flat version.

For the E flat version, they usually need a trumpet shank and very minimally a cup the size of a flugelhorn mouthpiece cup. Larger and something halfway between trumpet and small trombone but with some depth is probably best.

Blessing used to offer something like this I'm thinking, but it was sort of too big for an F mellophone.

In summary, I think the old Blessing 6V and DEG 6V were minimal for an E flat tenor horn, and the old 5 that Blessing sold was about right for an E flat tenor horn. I believe Wick would be the best source for a proper mouthpiece for an E flat.

[gocsick]

In summary, I think the old Blessing 6V and DEG 6V were minimal for an E flat tenor horn, and the old 5 that Blessing sold was about right for an E flat tenor horn. I believe Wick would be the best source for a proper mouthpiece for an E flat.

I have a H.N. White Eb Alto horn from the 1920's.. I use a Blessing 5 in it and it works a treat. I am 95% sure it is a copy of the Wick 5 which is the smallest diameter but deepest tenor horn mouthpiece in their line. The partials got really wonky with mine when I tried a wider shallower Wick 3. Cool little horn.. but have never found any kind of use for it other than noodling around in the basement. It is wasn't basically free, I never would have bought it.

[claf]

Mercer & Barker is also very good.
I myself use a Mercer & Barker MB2-H.

[MikeS]

Kind of an unusual instrument to amass and kind of obsolete unless you’re in a British style brass band. Does he play them…?

They are also widely used in Mexican banda music. Put them on LA Craigslist and I’ll bet they go pretty quickly.

[TxTx]

It's a bit confusing, because alto and tenor are used interchangeably when discussing E-flat instruments of this nature. (It took me a couple of months sometime in the last year or two to realize this, as I had never paid much attention to this particular nomenclature.)

Thanks for mentioning this - I have a Eb alto horn and Eb tubas so I was wondering where a tenor might fit in there.

I’ve never had anything but a trumpet mouthpiece for it, so thanks for the leads on them too!

Eric

[bloke]

The owner doesn't drive cars, and some college students from his same town showed up late last night for me to repair their trumpets (the only time we could find that we both had available).

They brought the tenor horns owner's payment, and took his instruments back to him.
Along with payment, he sent a #2 valve slide (from another tenor horn) with a small dent, and a couple of mouthpieces that just needed their shanks straightened a little bit.
One of those two mouthpieces was a Bach 5 (dedicated E flat instrument mouthpiece (sort of a trumpet rim - but larger circle - and sort of a French horn deep cup - but wider) that was obviously made for these instruments. The shank was undersized for all of the instruments of this particular batch of three, but with cardboard wrapped around the shank the Bach 5 played all of the instruments here pretty nicely - particularly the Bossey & Hawkes Regent.

[anadmai]

Interesting person. I believe he used to be on the staff of Mr Rogers' Neighborhood television program.

Alto Horns AND Mister Rogers?????

Now you got my attention.

The B&H alto interests me the most.

But I need to know more about the Mister Rogers connection.

[bloke]

Interesting person. I believe he used to be on the staff of Mr Rogers' Neighborhood television program.

Alto Horns AND Mister Rogers?????

Now you got my attention.

The B&H alto interests me the most.

But I need to know more about the Mister Rogers connection.

I don't know what he did.
Obviously, a national program like that requires a considerable staff to run smoothly.
Wandering off on yet another topic, I wonder how many people realize how incredible that pianist was who worked on that show.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnny_Costa

Although we always recognized the music at the beginning of the program, I wonder who also picked up that he never quite played it the same way twice (nor anything else he played during the program.

[anadmai]

I am a huge Johnny Costa fan. Mister Rogers wrote all the music and Johnny would improv it on every live taping. Handyman Joe Negri was an amazing jazz guitarist. He recently passed. Francois Clemmons is/was a doctorate level opera performer.

Fred introduced us to so much music. Even had a taping where Wynton Marasalis came in and played with the guys.

A Pittsburgh Native. He is one of my top favorite piano players.

George Shearing
Vince Guaraldi
Johnny Costa


Thank you for mentioning him. He's a forgotten treasure.

[prodigal]

His neighborhood was based on Squirrel Hill back in the day.

Mister Rogers was/is a national treasure.

[anadmai]

So much Pittsburgh awesomeness in that program.

I have a half sleeve tattoo dedicated to the Neighborhood of Make Believe.

There is so much about the man and the work he has done to admire.