Eb Alto/Tenor Horn & The Salvation Army

[MarChant]

Today I have played the three horns at my mom's house. She couldn't hear a difference, but I believe the Courtois has a little bit more warmth in its tone. The BM Symphonic is the best player of the three, both in ease and intonation. But then again, that was made probably in the 1990's and the others some 65-70 years earlier.
I have recorded me (on my phone) playing the opening bars of "ballade" by John Golland. Don't judge me on my playing, as I am just an amateur...
(Pictures: 1. Courtois 2. BM Symphonic 3. Mahillon)

[notaverygoodname]

The variety of F and Eb Alto things is pretty much endless. Regardless, comparing any of them to the French Horn is an insult to the French Horn. Hardly any of these instruments are any match for the Horn in any category.

Some quick summaries ranked by size.

Couesnon Cor-Alto (Eb) : Jam your hand up the bell and use something like Horn mouthpiece. Power and projection like a woodwind. Good range. Gives you carpal tunnel if you don't already have it.

York Concert Mellophone (F/Eb) : With classic mouthpiece in F? Totally useless. With small mouthpiece (JK C1A 9.5mm shank) in Eb? Alto Sax competitor. Plays up to 12th partial. Not as pretty sounding or cool looking as others.

Marching Mellophone (F) : Worst instrument to ever become mainstream.

Conn Mellophonium (F) : Iconic instrument with a pretty boring sound. If you have the original Conn 1 mouthpiece and good ears, the intonation is alright. Mile wide pitch center has its benefits.

DEG Marching Alto (F/Eb) : Basically a Soloist Alto with a massive .490" bore. Beautiful warm sound. Too bad it looks dumb and has goofy ergonomics.

Conn 14C Marching Alto Horn (F) : Pretty much the (pen)ultimate American Alto. Horrible intonation. Average range. Really good at everything else. Totally worth the struggle.

Ukraine Rotary Alto Horn (Eb) : Similar to the Conn, but almost unbearably loud. Plays better with a smaller mouthpiece than the Russian version.

Russian Rotary Alto Tuba (Eb) : Requires a pretty specialized mouthpiece (I use JK PA1B 10.5mm shank), but it's easily the best of them all. Paint by numbers intonation and enough power to blow away an entire ensemble. 8th partial is quite difficult.


I'm still working on developing a suitable mouthpiece for the King Altonium and Getzen Frumpet. I expect that these instruments will have an extremely bright sound, once I achieve viable intonation. My first attempt was 17.6mm x ~18mm x 4.2mm throat and it still had octave compression (lol). Revision 1 will be 2 cup sizes smaller, and 4.8mm bore.

[MarChant]

So, I recently started playing around with an Alto Horn and I like it very much. So much so, I'm even considering switching from Euphonium to Alto Horn when the Covid-rules allow band practice again. However, my current Band is a Wind Symphony band an an upright Alto would seem weird. With that in mind, I got a Circular Alto (and no, that is apparently NOT the same as a Mellophone: http://www.alsmiddlebrasspages.com/mellophone/) so it would be less noticeable, but still it is played right-handed so would look odd next to a normal left-handed French Horn. Unfortumately, there are not many Brass Bands in The Netherlands, at least not near me, and the ones that are close already have enough Alto players. So for now, I'm just playing solo's with piano accompaniment (for now only pre-recorded tracks because I cannot play together with a real pianist due to the current limited-visitor covid rule/advice) at my mom's house once or twice a week.