August 30, 2011
Greetings Interwebs! I know it has been a while since I last updated the journal section of the website. My apologies. I always say I will try to do more frequent updates, but alas, time gets sucked up into other projects. I find myself typing here tonight in a special place in my life. My wife is now home on maternity leave and we're about 3-4 weeks away (knock on wood!) from the birth of our daughter. We are incredibly excited... but stressed out too... lots to still prepare around the house, especially since my horns take up almost every closet space and are noticably present in nearly every room in the house... what can I say, I'm a collector!
Today, I wanted to blog about a recent day I spent with John Cather at his shop in Manhattan Beach, California. John is an excellent trumpeter, trombonist, historic brass player and craftsman. He worked in Joe Marcinkiewicz's shop in Glendale back in the day, where he learned mouthpiece fabrication and brass instrument building. John makes a few boutique mouthpieces out of the shop in his garage. His alto trombone mouthpieces (they are quite cool, 22-23mm inner rim with shallow cup, for players that want a brilliant alto sound, check 'em out!) are well respected. He also makes some beautiful historic trumpet replicas that are stunning! My early music ensemble, Tesserae, recently performed a concert of Venetian brass music at the Contrapuntal Hall in Brentwood California. My new Eb alto sackbut, a beautiful instrument made by my friend Markus Leuchter in Germany, just arrived and I was searching for an authentic mouthpiece that gave me the sound I wanted but was easy to switch back and forth from the tenor to alto and back again, which I did quite a bit on this particular program. My Egger RT6V is my go to tenor piece, but I was having trouble finding good match for the alto. I wanted an alto piece that felt like the RT6V but a scaled down version for correct pitch and sound. Of course, it was a week before the concert so getting a new piece from one of the big European makers was out of the question. I decided to call up John, as his alto trombone pieces are excellent modern pieces that yield the brilliance I was after. John agreed to custom make an alto sackbut piece for me from scratch! He started by taking measurements and making lead templates of my Egger tenor piece. After completing a scale drawing, he began to figure out new specifications for the alto piece using calculations... which yielded our starting point for the new mouthpiece.
John cut a piece of brass stock and began by drilling a backbore. He then removed material, a little bit at a time, to turn down the shank.
Once the shank was the correct taper it was time to start on the cup. Using a custom shank tool, the mouthpiece was flipped over in the lathe and held in place by the shank. John began to cut the rim and inner cup. Once we had the dimensions exact to our calculations, I began testing the mouthpiece on my alto sackbut. It didn't look like a mouthpiece, more like a chunck of brass with a shank on it... but it gave an idea of the sound and the feel of where we were. Surprisingly, it was nearly right on the money off the bat! I suggested some slight modifications and it went back on the lathe. We went back and forth a few times for fine tuning. Soon after we found just the right backbore for intonation sloting, rim contour (or lack of it, this is a sackbut piece after all!) for articulation and comfort and the proper depth of cup to match my instrument and my playing. I was satisfied and it was time to do the decorative outer shape. John did a great job using my Egger piece (which is basically of copy of a Geert van der Heide piece, also an excellent maker) as a model but still making his own shape, all free handed. Here is the end result!
The mouthpiece is a great success. It came out totally beautiful and sounds fantastic. The whole experience was a lot of fun and John is a terrfic guy and craftsman. Make sure you check out his website for his alto trombone mouthpieces, historic brass pieces as well as other fun stuff.
www.cathermusic.com
Apologies for the poor quality pictures, my iPhone was the best I had to capture the day. I'll try to get a clear snapshot of the completed mouthpiece (which I've since had gold plated). That's all for now. Till next time!
June 19, 2011
Hello again. My apologies for the big break in between journal updates. Things have been busy in my life, all good things! My wife and I are expecting a daughter in September. We are very excited. I just moved The Brassark into a new storefront with my good friend, trombonist, and business partner, Brad Close. Juggling my time with gigs, students, web updates, photo editing and family time proves to be a challenge. I'll try to be updating more frequently in the future.
Today for the journal, we have a really special horn that resides in my collection. I received a call last Novemeber from a woman named Stella. She had two vintage trombones that belonged to her father and she wanted me to come appraise them so she could donate them. Imagine my surprise when I opened the case and found a very rare Earl Williams bass trombone! Turns out Stella's father was Louis Castellucci and he played bass trombone in the Los Angeles Philharmonic in the 1930s and 40s, right after Spike Wallace (the original partner of Earl Williams Trombones) vacated the bass trombone chair. In addition to his orchestral work, Mr Castellucci played trombone on many of the great film scores of the time and conducted many bands and orchestras in Los Angeles. I plan on writing a entire section on Mr. Castellucci, as he was a legendary musician in Hollywood with an amazing musical story. In the meantime, here are some detailed pictures of his Earl Williams bass trombone.
I believe Earl used a variety of parts from various makers when assembling this bass trombone. The bell is unstamped but appears to be from a Conn 70H. The valve looks similar to the valves being used on the New York Bach 50B bass trombones. The valve section was hand assembled by Earl with his own braces.
The hand slide has the trademark Earl Williams curved hand grip, as well as his slide tuning mechanism. It is a wide slide, much larger than similar slides from other makers of the period. It is constructed from parts that Earl made, as well as, what I believe are Olds parts. Interestingly, there is no stamping or patent numbers other than a serial number on the bottom outer tube. From what Stella has told me about her father, I believe this horn dates to the early 1930s and it may be one of the first bass trombones Earl assembled.
The sound of this trombone is incredible. It has a beautiful singing timbre with a large powerful sound. Listen for the bass trombone in the soundtrack on Gone With The Wind (Yes, that's Mr Castellucci and this bass trombone) and you'll know exactly what this horn sounds like. It is an honor to be the caretaker for such a historic instrument. Stella and I have remained in contact from the first day we met. She's an amazing lady and a dear friend, as is her whole family. If you have any questions about Mr Castellucci or his trombone, drop me an email.
Till next time!
January 15, 2011
Greetings fellow trombonists and lovers of vintage brass instruments! Finally, my first entry into my journal! I plan on using this section of my website as a blog/musings/ collection of interesting information on brass instruments and all things in between. I will post photos of some of the finest and most rare instruments I encounter. These horns are not necessarily in my personal collection, but rather displayed here for all to enjoy
I was teaching one of my students and towards the end of the lesson I was presented with an old stinky Conn case... I'm thinking, OK another Conn 2H or similar generic old trombone. To my surprise, emerges one of the most stunning trombones I've ever come across in all of the years of collecting! Here is an Olds tenor trombone, tuning in the slide, silver plated instrument with a fully hand engraved bell depicting Jesus Christ emerging from the heavens flanked by Angels. I've seen religious engravings on instruments before, but never anything this epic! The detail work is stunning! The instrument dates to the early 1930s.
Turns out, this trombone was custom built by Olds in Los Angeles for one of the founding members of the Foursquare Church (founded by Aimee McPherson) in Echo Park. The artwork covers most of the bell, it must have been an incredible amount of work and time. Unlike the engraving of the Stemberg instruments from Conn, this portrait engraving is not as refined
I'm most impressed with the figure of Jesus Christ, which has stunningly detailed shading, texture and ornamentation. The portrait is much higher quality when compared to the Angel engravings.
It's hard to attribute this engraving to any specific artist. I assume that it was done by the best engraver at the Olds factory. It is possible that this work was outsourced... it's almost impossible to know. The style of this engraver reminds me of some of the Wallace and Williams trombones from this same vintage. Earl Williams was an employee of Olds and I am sure had access to their engravers. I can speculate that this engraver probably also did some of the art on Earl's trombones.
Until next time...