Besson Notes

[JTJ]

Played a new Sovereign 967 and a new Prestige 2052 at Tuba Exchange last week using a Heritage 3AL. A couple of quick notes:

The high concert B played 2nd valve was fine on both of them, and sung out clean and nice on each horn.

The 967 blew more open and had a nicer sound than the Prestige. This was a sample of one for each horn, and should not be taken to indicate anything about the general differences between the models.

John

[highams]

Besson Notes

Hi John,

Yes I discovered a similar thing last year, a new Besson Sov played much more freely than the 2052 Prestige. A pupil of mine has one too that is very, very good in fact.

Chas

[daruby]

Besson Notes

Guys,

I can't speak to the horns you have tried, but I know my new 2051 now blows about as freely as any horn can with a sound that suits my own "inner voice" just about perfectly. The mods I have had done to my own horn and the effects of "playing in" have definitely made it a better horn than when I originally purchased it back in the summer of 2007.

I did try an early German-made 967 (back in March-April of 2007) and compared it with my old round stamp 967. The new horn was lighter in sound with vastly superior mechanical characteristics and somewhat better responsiveness. Last summer, I did play an older British 2052 Prestige (the horn of Black Dykes 2nd seat euphonium) and it was much stuffier and harder to play than my own horn (though darker).

Generally, the Prestige horns are "different" in that they use heavier valve caps, although I think I have seen new Sovereigns with the Prestige-style heavier caps too. If the 967 has the older style valve caps, the horn will sound and play a bit "freer" and more open at the expense of some "edge" in the sound. Since the Prestige comes with both kinds of valve caps, I have experimented with my own horn to verify this.

Also, the additional mechanism for the tuning trigger adds some weight and stiffness to the horn. in particular, the bracing between the horn body and the main tuning slide is quite different between the Sov. and Prestige with the Prestige being made with heavyweight cast pieces instead of the curved brass wire braces the Sovereign uses. Otherwise a 967 and a 2052 should be nearly identical.

I am not sure I have the ability to generalize about sound/playability of new Prestige vs. new Sovereign, but I would characterize new Besson as generally a bit lighter in sound and much more responsive vs. old Besson.

Doug