Oh -- I see.  The Vuvuzela already *is* a collapsible horn, just not 
long enough.  Well, what's China waiting for?


On 6/27/2011 6:23 PM, David Goldberg wrote:
> Do an image-google on 'collapsible cup' and 'collapsible funnel'.  This
> is the future of Have Horn, Will Travel.
>
> David G
>
> On 6/27/2011 4:41 PM, valerie wells wrote:
>> Steve's made an excellent suggestion with the plastic tubing idea.  I seem
>> to remember reading about a horn player who carried tubing&   a mouthpiece in
>> his car&   he would practice lip slurs while he commuted to&   from work.  If
>> I recall, he said it was enough to keep his chops in very good shape, so
>> that he could focus on other technical aspects at home.  That would work for
>> me, because I believe I could do my BE exercises on a plastic tube.
>>
>> Okay, now it's time for clever person to invent a plastic travel horn w/
>> detachable bell to sell for less than $50.  (I'm thinking of the lovely
>> vuvuzuela's!)  Anyone into plastics?  There's definitely a need for such a
>> product.  Come on, we need this!
>>
>> As for fingering, there are French horn fingering aps for I-phones&
>> Blackberries.
>>
>> Valerie Wells
>> The Balanced Embouchure Method
>> http://bebabe.wordpress.com/
>> http://www.beforhorn.blogspot.com/
>>
>>
>> Message: 9
>> Date: Sun, 26 Jun 2011 17:47:14 -0700
>> From: Steve Haflich<[email protected]>
>> Subject: Re: [Hornlist]
>> To: The Horn List<[email protected]>
>> Message-ID:<[email protected]>
>>
>> When I need to travel on a NHR trip. I sometimes take along a mouthpiece
>> and some tubing.  Your local aquarium supply (or even a plain pet shop)
>> will carry flexible plastic tubing in several diameters.  This stuff has
>> negligible weight and rolls nicely into a suitcase.
>>
>> I, like you, find it better than practicing on a bare mouthpiece, but it
>> doesn't really provide a good substitute for a horn, even a valveless
>> horn, because of several deficiencies:
>>
>>    - The tubing is too narrow, hence has very high resistance.
>>
>>    - The cylindrical bore is grossly out of tune, especially on the low
>>     harmonics.  The reasons this happens to a cylindrical bore have been
>>     discussed previously.
>>
>> The nice feature of this arrangement is that the cylindrical tubing
>> doesn't couple very well to the atmosphere, and the plastic tubing
>> absorbs a lot of energy, the the practice setup is nicely soft.  I've
>> played in hotel rooms without problem.
>>
>> Another nice feature is that the thumb over the end of the tube works a
>> little (a _very_ little) like the right hand on a waldhorn.
>>
>> I've tried correcting the tuning problem by using two different sizes of
>> tubing, the smaller nested into the larger.  But this provides only a
>> single step increase in bore, and I didn't find that it helped much.  It
>> did slightly reduce the excessive resistance, but not very much.
>>
>> But thinking about this abysmal practice instrument, I have a few ideas
>> in case anyone else wants to experiment.
>>
>> First, try selecting larger diameter aquarium tubing rather than
>> smaller.  If you must, use a rather short segment of small tubing and
>> nest that into a long segment of wider tubing.  Narrow tubing makes the
>> instrument too resistant to blowing.
>>
>> Second, choose an instrument length significantly longer that 12.5-foot
>> F length.  Since the lower partials are out of tune, constructing a
>> lower instrument will make the harmonics you actually use closer to
>> being in pitch.  I haven't tried this, but perhaps 16-foot C would be
>> good.
>>
>> But here is the real idea that I'd like to throw out in case some horn
>> atelier has more energy to put into developing a product than I do:
>>
>> The quietness, lightness, and cheapness of aquarium tubing is attractive
>> for making a practice instrument.  But the conical bore make the
>> instrument only marginally playable.  I imagine most plastic tubing is
>> extruded at constant width, but suppose some clever manufacturer could
>> figure out how to _cast_ similar material into a conical shape similar
>> to a horn bore, complete with bell.  Might be very difficult to
>> construct, but if it could be done, one would have a very quiet
>> instrument that could be simply mashed into checked luggage and which
>> would then return to approximate shape when the suitcase is opened.
>>
>> If this could be manufactures and sold for $100, I think there would be
>> a market for travel practice instruments.
>>
>>
>> --
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