Comments on: Review: The Jin Bao bass trumpet

By: mycroft

mycroft — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 03:10:32 +0000

I am certainly in no way blessing Jin Bao–or any Chinese or Indian manufacturer–a blanket approval. It’s a crapshoot, really. However, I *do* think that, barring in bizarre defects (G/B horn? Jeez!) they can be made to function, unless the brass is so thin it leaves fingerprints. I had a Chinese horn a few years ago that had such a thin gauge this was possible. :-0

By: Tim Watkins

Tim Watkins — Wed, 09 Jan 2008 15:57:11 +0000

A few years ago, one of my middle school students got a brand new Jin Bao double horn. It looked beautiful and the valves felt great. The problem was, this supposed F/Bb horn was actually pitched in G/B!!! The parents promptly took it back for a refund.

By: mycroft

mycroft — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 17:45:55 +0000

I wasn’t completely happy with the Schilke, either, but it was the smallest one I had. I also recently acquired a Jin Bao Eb alto trombone as well, so perhaps it’d be worth my while to pick up the 22C and a Laskey that you mention for experimentation.

I’ve read on The Trombone Forum that the Bach bass trumpet gets a good sound, but I’m a bit of a purist and believe that the horn as initially designed in the 19th c. should be a rotary, so I’ll keep poking and prodding this one until I can get a concert-ready sound out of it rather than going piston. Of course, if I had buckets o’ cash, I’d probably buy a Dotzauer or a Lidl, but…

Funny you’d mention the horn sub thing, as that’s part of the reason I got it; after hearing the Mnozil Brass, I got all jazzed about it!

By: MikeS

MikeS — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 17:36:57 +0000

I have one of the Lidl bass trumpets, which seems to be the prototype the Jin Bao folk used in designing their horn. I played the mouthpiece game with it and found, as you did, that smaller is better. The Schilke 42B, the Dorsey copy you mention, made the final three but finished third. The horn has a lot of resistance and the tiny throat on the Schilke exacerbated this. Plus it’s more than a millimeter smaller than anything Bach makes. I had an old Bach 22C which gave a more trumpety sound and provided a bit more chop room; all in all not bad. The winner in this sweepstakes was the Laskey 42C that I also use on alto trombone. The Laskey semed to really clean up attacks, is easier to play and gives me more flexibility over tone color than anything else I’ve tried. Ferguson’s web site mentions using an 11C as a starting point. My wife’s comment when I tried one was, “No valve trombones are allowed in this household. Don’t try to sneak one through the back door.”

The Lidl seems to me like a competent but not spectacular horn. It’s nowhere as nice as the one Dotzauer I’ve played. I think the rotary horns have a more characteristic bass trumpet sound than any of the piston valve horns I’ve tried. I’d take the Lidl over the Bachs I’ve played for that reason alone. Oddly enough, the most use I get from the bass trumpet on gigs are last-minute calls to sub for horn players in quintets. This happens often enough that I’ve managed to cover my costs on the horn. Who’d have thought?