Bb French Horn

[Lancerlady]

Thank you Mr. Frank for this interesting reasoning. It makes sense to me.

I remember when you were teaching us in 86, you and Mr. Tom Lizotte detected that I needed a 6v mouth piece to get the tone that was needed for the quartet... :) A good mouth piece can change everything, can't it? (See I remembered).

Oh and speaking of Cavaliers, didn't they use a Flugel horn soloist in 2004, James Bond show, during the ballad? Talk about a great sound!

Edited November 18, 2005 by Lancerlady

[Kamarag]

Having a mello pitched in F makes it a true middle-voice horn. Having it in Bb would make it more like a low trumpet part, or a high bari part.

[ironlips]

Lancerlady,

You had a beautiful sound on mellophone precisely because you approached it with a French Horn aesthetic.

This topic is titled "Bb French Horn" so I expected a discussion about the difference between it and the F instrument. The Bb was develpoed, I believe, to facilitate the transition from trumpet for younger players in wind bands. The ancestor of the orchestral horn was the hunting horn, and before valves were developed "legit" players had several horns and crooks to allow for playing in all the popular keys.

(Pepe Notaro, of course, could coax any pitch from a bugle French Horn, with or without a valve, rotor, slide or crook.)

[Lancerlady]

Lancerlady,

You had a beautiful sound on mellophone precisely because you approached it with a French Horn aesthetic.

Coming from you Mr. Frank, what an honor, that's the nicest thing anyone has said to me in a long...thank you.. (Besides my husband of course who says something nice very day! :)

Edited November 19, 2005 by Lancerlady

[g0at]

Also from a visual standpoint, bell-front brass looks so much cleaner and appealing. French horns just look goofy. Also , in 20th-Century DCI drill, marching french horns is near impossible.

[JayM]

Also from a visual standpoint, bell-front brass looks so much cleaner and appealing. French horns just look goofy. Also , in 20th-Century DCI drill, marching french horns is near impossible.

I think you are confused. A Bb marching french horn is a bell-front instrument.

We're not talking about marching with regular french horns here.

[Slow Adam]

Also from a visual standpoint, bell-front brass looks so much cleaner and appealing. French horns just look goofy. Also , in 20th-Century DCI drill, marching french horns is near impossible.

Non-Bell front brass is still illegal in DCI.

Here's a pic of a marching french horn (King). Looks kind of like a baritone at first glance, but the plumbing is different and the mouthpiece is small a la mellophone.

Edited November 20, 2005 by Slow Adam

[Orpheus]

Sort of a trivia question, apropos of nothing ... but has a successful D1 (or Open Class) DCI corps ever marched a hornline with *NO* mellophones any time in the past couple of decades? Mellos are practically all you see today, but altos, french horns, and flugels used to be a lot more common. Who has ever marched a mid-voice section with no mellos?

Edited November 20, 2005 by Orpheus

[Jeff]

That's why many try to disguise their sound by using V-cup mouthpieces. This is done quite successfully by the Cavaliers who have the finest imitation French Horn sound in the activity. To my ear it's the best sound I've ever heard from a mellophone section. Of course, they don't actually sound like mellophones.

It's not just about the velocity of movement. Not by a long shot. Consider that the mellophone is not used anywhere except in marching music. Yes, Kenton tried them for a while but abandoned the instrument mainly due to the timbre and intonation thrill ride they provided. I leave it to the reader to discern the reasons why you will not find a mellophone in the orchestra or stage band.

Frank,

The Cavaliers played mellophone mouthpieces designed by Larry Kershner. To describe them briefly they look like a roll of quarters, with a trumpet rim, and a french horn cup. John Simpson had one this summer and gave me a chance to examine it. John was also instrumental in getting deeper mellophone mouthpieces in vogue by employing them with the Sky Ryders back in the earlier 1980's. That was a sweet sounding brass line that deserves wider recognition.

Now as to use of a mellophone outside of the marching arena, Pat Metheny had one during his Secret Story tour. It was played in a few songs as part of a flugel-mellophone duo.

[Dave]

Sort of a trivia question, apropos of nothing ... but has a successful D1 (or Open Class) DCI corps ever marched a hornline with *NO* mellophones any time in the past couple of decades? Mellos are practically all you see today, but altos, french horns, and flugels used to be a lot more common. Who has ever marched a mid-voice section with no mellos?

Didn't Vanguard 01 march all French horns? I seem to recall hearing that somewhere. Maybe it was just all euphoniums instead of baritones.