Posted by Eric Lutz on January 07, 2003 at 13:18:22:
In Reply to: Mouthpiece Question posted by BPE on January 07, 2003 at 00:56:01:
The 24AW is a nice, comfortable mouthpiece. It works great with my old King sousaphone, and I can play it all night without getting tired.
I had tried a Conn Helleberg 7B with this same horn and got very frustrated because I had a lot of trouble controlling pitch, or "fracking." This was especially true for any notes above middle Bb. The switch to the 24AW made the King play like a totally different horn.
After buying a bigger tuba, I was finding that the 24AW was limiting the lower notes. A switch to a Bach 18 helped with lower range intonation, plus helped produce a slightly bigger tone.
The Helleberg produces a slightly livelier (vibrant?)tone, but I still had some problems with pitch control. So I'm sticking with the Bach 18.
Just my experience with the different mouthpieces, for what it's worth. Not a whole lot different from what Rick had to say.