The horn that interested me most of all, was the so-called “Bubbie” tuba, a travel tuba in F (or Eb with the extension slide). Although the photographs on the Wessex website illustrate graphically how small the thing is, nothing prepares you for the experience of holding it and playing it for the first time. It’s roughly the size of a Tenor Horn, with a 9″ bell and four rotary valves.

Obviously, with such a narrow bore, there is a lot of resistance, and it feels stuffy compared with a full-sized bass tuba. With a bit of careful placing of notes, though, it’s possible to get a good tone out of it. It’s much happier in F than it is in Eb, which is to be expected. What I didn’t expect was that the notes below the stave would sound as good as they do. It has a sound of its own – somewhere between a tuba and a bass trombone. Initial blowing suggests that it’s a multiphonic toybox too – I was pleasantly surprised to find that upper partials rang out clear and strong. Notes can be bent a huge distance too.

I’d be reluctant to use the Bubbie for any normal playing purposes when playing out (unless my big Eb happened to be in for repair), but I can see it being really useful in the context of ORE. It’ll also be great for practising late at night with the practice mute. Most importantly, it’s enormous FUN.

Wessex Tubas - "Bubbie" mini-Eb/F

The tuba that impressed me most was the 5/4 CC. For the money I think it’s stunning. Gorgeous tone, easy to play and very well in tune. If I had the room for one and the cash to spare, I’d have one, without question.

The BBb tubas were less to my liking. I’m not really a Bb player, but have owned one in the past. The best of the bunch was the 4/4 rotary BBb, with a really solid, meaty bass tone. It felt great once I’d switched from my normal mouthpiece to an extra-large one supplied by Jonathan. The front-action piston-valved BBb had a massive bore and a wonderfully huge tone, but I found it difficult to fill with enough air. That probably has more to do with me than the instrument. The 3+1 BBb I didn’t like at all. I found its intonation a bit lacking compared with the others in the higher registers, but realistically if it was used as a band instrument it would probably be fine.

The 3+1 EEb plays really well – nice clear tone, and well in tune. For me, the height of the lead pipe was uncomfortably low, as I’m long in the back. Jonathan assured me that that’s something he’s working with the factory in China to set straight, although he will carry on stocking instruments with the lower lead pipe for younger players. That seems eminently sensible to me.

I also tried the (rather unexpected!) saxhorn, the C/Bb tenor tuba, the excellent euphonium, and the tenor horn, all of which I liked.

I’m really excited by what Jonathan is doing. There will always be a market for higher-end instruments, and I’m not about to give up my beloved Sovereign, but for players on a budget, or for players who need more than one instrument, there’s now a sensible way of doing it without heading for bankruptcy. Yes, I have my reservations about the BBb tubas, but I’d still happily recommend them based on their price alone.

As for me, I’ve ordered a silver “Bubbie” and look forward to getting to know it in due course, and I shall be watching Wessex Tubas develop with interest.

What happens when Penny Goring and I collaborate on a words and music project? BOLUS, that’s what. Penny is, as any of you who know her work from her blog and the Year Zero Writers website, a pretty extraordinary writer – and her spoken word delivery marvellously detached and deadpan.

I’ve wanted to do more instrumental backings for spoken word pieces for a while – and when Penny sent me recordings of her works “House” and “Temporary Passport” they seemed ideal. Musically I’ve drawn inspiration from William Basinski’s “Disintegration Loops” plus my beloved doom/drone metal, as well as using some more folky instruments – the Appalachian dulcimer makes an appearance, as does Estragon the deluxe shruti box. There’s even a tuba solo in there somewhere.

Here’s an excerpt from Temporary Passport:

BOLUS – Temporary Passport – excerpt by Stuart Estell

You can buy the mini-album as an MP3 download from Amazon for just £1.38 by clicking here.

It’s also available on iTunes but thanks to a pricing cock-up in the hands of the electronic distributiony people it’s considerably more expensive on there. Plus you can also listen on Spotify here.

I didn’t know Trish personally at all, but still vividly remember her amazing ice-cold stage presence during the only time I saw Broadcast perform live at the Irish Centre in Digbeth. Incidentally, that was the very same evening that I met John Peel and talked with him about The Fall and Polythene.

The score is available at the IMSLP / Petrucci Music Library at imslp.org

The programme is yet to be finalised but is probably going to be something along these lines:

Howard Skempton
Well, well, Cornelius
June ’77
Piano Piece 1969
Swedish Caprice
Quavers 3

Reflections

Notti Stellate a Vagli

Interval

Philip Glass
Mad Rush

Morton Feldman
Palais de Mari

I may replace the Glass with some more Feldman – that’s the thing I’m unsure of at the moment. I’ve had a very interesting few weeks playing all of this very quiet music; technical demands are (almost) absent, but the musical demands are absolutely huge. The whole enterprise is proving to be most enlightening…

I’m hoping that there will be a mystery première too.

Retrouvailles

So, off I went. To my surprise, I’ve managed to get the bulk of the piece learnt in about three weeks, spending between half an hour and an hour a day on it, although going back to the piano regularly to reinforce what I’d been doing.

As I got Retrouvailles under my fingers, I learned a few things that wasn’t expecting to learn from this piece.

Firstly, Carter is extremely expressive and lyrical. This is something that didn’t jump off the page at me to start with, especially when working slowly on the mildly intimidating flurries of notes.

The only experience I can relate this to is the moment I realised what a wonderful expansive melody the theme of the last movement of Webern’s Variations op. 27 has. As I said in my previous post, converts will be aware of this already, but Carter writes great tunes.

Secondly, it’s strangely memorable music; I’m lucky in that I don’t find memorisation too difficult, but in any case Retrouvailles worked its way into my head without my having to give it any real assistance.

As I played it from memory, I came to my final discovery. I realised that I had effectively stopped counting. In essence – rhythmically at least – I found myself playing Retrouvailles by ear. It was at this point that the spacing of Carter’s phrases started to feel completely natural.

And I wonder, especially with the more rhythmically-complex works, whether that isn’t the approach I need to take: learn how the rhythms sound, then stop counting. That would certainly tally with Joe’s comments, on my last post on the subject of Carter, about the first of the Diversions.

I’m now doing battle with the much harder 90+, and will be interested to see whether this approach works.

“Will Beckett’s March (Reprise)” from the album Mother’s Thinking Bath is receiving an airing on the very marvellous Bob Osborne’s Salford City Radio programme “Reformation” tomorrow night, between 9pm and 10pm.

This week’s playlist, apparently, is comprised mostly of artists associated with Invisible Girl Records – which is where the Mother’s Thinking Bath track comes in, as it was, of course, featured on the Invisible Girl Records compilation A Place In Space.

Salford City Radio is on 94.4FM or you can listen online.

On the theme of “Silence”, I’m now the proud owner of a 4′ 33″ t-shirt, which has the Edition Peters frontispiece on the front, and the “tacet” version of the score of John Cage’s mighty silent work on the back. I wore it to work, and gratifyingly nobody asked me about it.

The album’s press release reads:

A compilation of original artists from around the planet.

This global release has been made available on the winter solstice
(21 December 2008)

Music, culture, sounds and experiences express this diverse collection of unique (with a capital U) artists on the compilation.

Ranging from Portugal, India, Uruguay, Japan, and France to name a few, the artists are specially selected by Invisiblegirl from the MySpace social networking site.

A Place In Space is a truly fascinating listening experience.

A Place In Space is available online from iTunes, by following this link  

There are a few CD copies available in the award-winning independent record store Piccadilly Records in Manchester