Methinks Paul is doing more than guessing. In my travels US players seem to like their horns to lie mainly in F and European players mainly in Bb; as to the rest of the globe I can't say. I've noticed that American players who have professional careers in Europe can often play either way without getting confused. If more teachers believed there might be a triple in their students' future and understood the advantage of playing a triple with the double side lying in Bb, they would encourage their students to play their doubles lying in Bb at the earliest opportunity so as to eliminate one part of the learning curve in switching to a triple in the middle of a career. I believe, but obviously do not have any empirical evidence, that this learning curve is what keeps some pros from taking on the triple and risking their career while they learn to play it; Mr Myers is certainly a notable exception. If teachers encouraged their students to learn the double lying in Bb that would eliminate a big stumbling block to switching to the triple and perhaps more players would be willing to do so. Having F/Bb/f together on the same horn has playing advantages over either a double or a descant separately; with the lighter technology of today, some triples are no heavier that doubles were in past years. There is now available a fully adjustable horn support that holds the weight of the horn while playing either standing or sitting. If you ever get to hear Kerry Turner and Kristina perform on their triples using this support, you will no longer have a valid argument that triples are too heavy. Unfortunately I lost the web page reference for these supports; maybe some kind reader will post it. As for the sound and feel issues, we performed an interesting comparison at the Finke booth during the recent Western Horn Symposium at Las Vegas. We had a gold brass Brendan model double and a gold brass Brendan triple. Some players could tell a little difference which was hardly noticeable to a listener, and others had no detectable difference. So, at least for Finke, the triple compares very favorable to the double of the same model series, in part because the Finke triple is in fact a double horn with a separate alto f horn as opposed to a descant with a separate low F horn.
Loren Mayhew \@() Finke Horns [EMAIL PROTECTED] (520) 403-6897 -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Paul Mansur Sent: Saturday, May 07, 2005 5:58 PM To: The Horn List Subject: Re: [Hornlist] Horns that stand in F or Bb I'll guess that very few in the US but a lot in other countries. I have a double that stands in Bb but it is a European model that just seems to work better that way. Paul Mansur On Saturday, May 7, 2005, at 07:41 PM, G wrote: > Hi, > > Just out of curiousity...how many of you play a double horn that > stands in Bb as opposed to F? > > Gary > _______________________________________________ > post: horn@music.memphis.edu > unsubscribe or set options at > http://music.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/p_mansur1%40comcast.net > _______________________________________________ post: horn@music.memphis.edu unsubscribe or set options at http://music.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/loren%40mayhews.us _______________________________________________ post: horn@music.memphis.edu unsubscribe or set options at http://music.memphis.edu/mailman/options/horn/archive%40jab.org
