Posted by Kenneth Sloan on July 09, 2001 at 09:52:05:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Euphonium: Bb or C??? posted by confused on July 09, 2001 at 08:26:49:
Why no C Euphonia?
Because all of the Orchestral parts for Euphonium lie equally as well on both Bb and C Euphoniums.
If you take the easy explanation that "CC tubas are better for orchestra, BBb tubas are better for band", then there's simply no need for an "orchestral euphonium".
One *might* argue that the French Tuba is a "euphonium in C" - but I wouldn't.
I would argue that the Bb-Eb-BBb "families" of instruments emerged from the realities of military funding, but never quite made the transition to the orchestra, which depended more on private patronage than on military spending. Out of the vast panoply of brass instruments found in the brass band, only a very few have made it into the orchestra. Bass and contrabass tubas have made it - but may be in the process of being assimilated into the C-F-CC regime.
A wonderful study in how arbitrary choices lead to ingrained tradition. Tell me, do you think that the bits in a computer "word" should be ordered from left-to-right or from right-to-left?