Posted by Morris Kainuma on August 12, 2002 at 18:43:06:
I took a trip to Dillon Music today to pick up some Hetman lubricants and a new mouthpiece, and tried a couple of horns while there (of course). The first was a Mirafone 1291 BBb tuba, 4 pistons + 1 rotor. Very nice; good response, good intonation, nice sound with a "fat" center to the tone. It looked to have the same body and bell as the 191 BBb, in the piston valve version. My usual mouthpiece is a Laskey 30G, it worked well on the 1291.
Next tuba: Meinl-Weston 195 BBb "Fafner", 4 rotary valves. Big, tall, amazing looking tuba. Easy response, good intonation, really big sound that still retains lots of center/core. My 30G worked fine on it, but it really took off with the Parke/Ofenloch.
Next tuba: Meinl-Weston 37 Wm. Bell model, 5 rotary valves. The tuba seemed quite a bit lighter in weight than other Bell model M-W's I've seen and played in the past. Compared to those older M-W 37's, this one seems to have better and more even response and better intonation. The low register is also more responsive. It also seemed to be quite efficient, putting out a good amount of sound w/o working very hard.
All of the above impressions are, of course, just my opinions.
Morris Kainuma