Posted by Rick Denney on December 27, 2001 at 10:07:38:
In Reply to: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Eb-Tuba Willson vs. Besson Sovereign posted by Frederick J. Young on December 25, 2001 at 18:51:37:
I know a fellow who studied violin-making in Cremona, and has measured and photographed (carefully) a number of Stradivarii, Guarneri, and Amati violins.
He suggests that the crudeness is what makes them sound the way they do, not the wood. He is making modern copies of these violins, violas, and cellos that reflect the assymetries of the originals. Most modern copies try to "correct" the mistakes of the originals to make them look better, but they don't sound as good. His clientele ranks right up there, and he isn't starving, so I expect he is doing okay with his theories. But despite his Ph.D. and his years of training, he is doing it rather than writing papers about it.
On this topic, I'm convinced that we don't know everything. A tuba that would be perfect all stretched out straight would be a failure once wrapped up, perhaps, or even a tuba with a taper that doesn't work as a straight tube works fine once wrapped up. And intonation is such as state of mind that I find it a little silly for someone to pronounce a tuba "in tune" or "out of tune", when those tendencies could easily be reversed with a different mouthpiece or player. If intonation tendencies were so fixed as the theories suggest, then players would have the same experience with the same tubas.
Of course, there are other factors, such as I have argued in the past. One is that string players, singers, and others who have complete control over intonation tend not to play the poor-sounding equally tempered scale, and have a tuba that plays to equal temperament might present the player with a battle in an actual performance on a real stage.
And, with all due respect to Dr. Young, whose work I respect tremendously, I must suggest that publication in a refereed journal about a subject that matters in a musical performance may still miss the point. The referees are not likely to care how the theories play out on the stage, and they are not likely to depend on those theories on real stages themselves, especially if it is a physics journal. I regularly review papers for several scientific journals, including some of the most respected in the world in my field, and know enough to question a statement of theory just because it was published in a juried journal.
The point is, of course, that tubas are musical instruments, not science experiments. As much as I want to understand (from my layman's perspective) the science of the tuba, it is how it produces the musical vision of the performer that really matters.
Rick "whose compensating euphonium presents intonation battles all its own" Denney