TromboneChat

Any thoughts on using a Bach 11C on alto?

I’ve been using some DE combinations, most of which work well enough, although they tend to sound tenorish. I have a Yam 48A which is what Yam includes with its altos. It tends to sound a bit nasal.

I pulled an 11C off of my shelf. First impressions are favourable.

Thoughts?

A Bach C cup is generally thought too deep for alto. Bach used to ship a 12EW with its Model 39 alto.

That said, my Conn 36H came with a Conn 7C. It's the only mouthpiece I have that lines up the partials correctly. Even a Bach 7C doesn't work. But I like my sound with a Bach 4C.

So if you like the sound you get with an 11C, play it. There is nothing in stone saying that a Bach C cup won't work with an Alto.

Thinking out of the Bachs!

I'm hardly an alto trombonist, but had decent results with my feeble attempts using a Schilke 47B.
Just the right size. Medium-shallow. Better match to alto. More comfortable than any of my Bach pieces.

I’ve always thought certain Marcinkiewicz mouthpieces would work well on altos.

Posaunus wrote: ↑Sun Dec 18, 2022 6:56 pm Thinking out of the Bachs!

Which alto are you playing? There is a pretty wide variety of alto concepts out there being produced currently. Different bell sizes, bore sizes, and so forth, so you really need to get a specific mouthpiece set up for each horn.

I generally go to the Bach C cups or similar from other manufacturers for alto. Deeper cups are too dull sounding and often flat in pitch, and shallower cups like E cups are just a bit too bright for me. The C's are the "Goldilocks" choice for me. Deeper or shallower might work for certain specific pieces, to deal with extremes of register, but I liken the sound of a Bach-style C cup for most alto playing.

Jim Scott

When I did play alto, I found 11c was a tenor mouthpiece. A real alto sound comes with something more in line with a 15.

I play an 11c sized piece (MST Studio K NY N) on small bore and alto. We have a second 11 c sized piece which us just slightly different which I sometimes use on alto when I feel it should be a bit lighter (K 11 N).

What I see there is absolutely no standard on alto, but 11 c is somehow in the middle of it.

hyperbolica wrote: ↑Mon Dec 19, 2022 5:13 am When I did play alto, I found 11c was a tenor mouthpiece. A real alto sound comes with something more in line with a 15.

I used a 15E in my Bach 39. Felt like much more of a distinctive "alto" sound, instead of just a tenor where I'm less confident about where the pitches are.

My alto is a JP Rath 236. It has a bore of .481. Not far off a King 2B.

A Bach 39 has a bore of about .468.

I can see a smaller mpc might suit the Bach. Yam supplies a 48A with its alto (.470-.490). A 48 is similar in size to a Bach 6.5 (a bit smaller). It plays well but I don’t particularly care for the tone.

I see a number of pros use a Bach 7C. I might give a Faxx 7C a try.

Try the Marcinkiewicz ET7 - it's shallow, but too small in the rim. Works best of anything on my alto bone.

Sorry I meant to say NOT TO SMALL IN THE RIM

I have three different altos, enough altos to notice the mouthpiece that fits one might not be the best for another. The Bach 39 works best with a Bach 12E or a 15E, but the latter has a too narrow rim for me to be comfortable. The two different Thomann 'stenciles' I have can take many different C-mouthpieces, like a Bach 11C, 12C or 7C. The partials line up good with all but the sound becomes more close to a small bore tenor with larger mouthpieces. Thats my experience.

/Tom

ssking2b wrote: ↑Mon Dec 19, 2022 12:08 pm Try the Marcinkiewicz ET7 - it's shallow, but not too small in the rim. Works best of anything on my alto bone.

Sounds like a good candidate. Lighter weight than the more massive Bach pieces - may be better suited to alto.

The real key with alto, in addition to getting a shallow cup, is making sure the backbore is right for alto playing. The DE alto backbores combined with an A or B cup is a no brainer. The 15CL also has an alto backbore.

You can get away with all kinds of dumb stuff on larger, more forgiving instruments. 3G with a bored out throat? No problem. Altos are less forgiving. I think that some stock pieces, certain 11Cs and 7Cs might work, they certainly do on paper, but none that I've tried have been any good.

The Shires 11C that comes with their altos is not what I'm after in an alto mouthpiece. Way too heavy, backbore is not right either. Same with the Alessi 1A -- too heavy, and the backbore is better suited to tenor.

I also like the sound of my Schilke 47B on alto, my face likes that size though.

I had a JP Rath 236 for awhile. I ended up liking a Shilke 43A which is both small and shallow. For something bigger, I sometimes used a Bach Mt. Vernon 15C. 11C seemed too big to me. I don't really need either of those mouthpieces anymore if someone got interested.

FWIW I notice a huge difference between an 11C and a 12C on my alto (Yamaha 671). I tried an 11C a few years ago. At home the 11C felt good, but once I got to rehearsal (playing a Mozart mass) it just didn’t work. Had real trouble centering pitch and with overall endurance. Switched to a Mt. Vernon 12C and everything got better. I’ve also used larger mouthpieces (6-3/4C, 7C) in orchestra performances with no problem. Didn’t someone once say every Bach trombone mouthpiece is a variation of one of two archetypes: the 12C (7C, 6-3/4C) and the 6-1/2AL (11C). Seems to be some truth to that in my experience.

Might be worth to have a look at Josef Klier, there are some good options for alto I think.
https://www.jk-klier.de/en/mouthpieces/ ... n#trombone
I use the JK Exklusive 9G and think it is a good choice but generally all the F and G models are recommended for alto. E might work for some as well.

I contacted Wedge in regards to a suitable option for an alto mouthpiece, and they recommended a 96C. I got one and it works very nicely. According to their mouthpiece comparison chart, it's around the size of a Bach 12C, but it's definitely built differently.

I have a Mt. Vernon Bach 11C that works very well with my Yamaha 871.

I tried the Bach 12 and the 15 on an Shires and honestly found both totally inadequate. I suspect the 11C would be also.

The reason is that those are all small tenor trombone mouthpieces. An alto trombone is not a small tenor trombone, it’s its own thing.

Have been working on figuring out the alto for about a year. I was surprised when I first got it that my range did not extend any farther than it did on the tenor. Others have reported the same. The advice from many is that the alto trombone will not extend your range, nor should it. If that’s the case, then everything I learned about 4 part harmony is wrong: alto and tenor apparently mean the same thing. So perhaps soprano and bass do as well?

That’s not right. The alto trombone, with the right mouthpiece, should extend both your upper and lower range up by roughly a P4. If you’re not getting that, if you have a tenor range on your alto trombone, you may be using a tenor mouthpiece. I suspect this is very common.

So I borrowed an E flat tenor horn (not tenor trombone) mouthpiece as an experiment, and it was like a light bulb turned on. All the sudden I have a normal alto range.

Now the tenor horn mouthpiece tone was not quite right, so I purchased an actual alto trombone mouthpiece from John Cather and it has opened the door for actual alto trombone playing. He makes an actual alto horn mouthpiece. That’s what I recommend. Don’t put a small tenor in the alto horn. Get an actual alto mouthpiece.

Not to criticize any who has had success using tenor trombone mouthpieces on the alto. If it sounds good, it is good.

Finding one has been difficult, as many small tenor trombone mouthpieces are advertised as alto mouthpieces. The Bach 15C is advertised as an alto mouthpiece, which it most certainly is not. I got the recommendation for the Bach 12 from some corner of the internet also. I haven’t yet sat down to start measuring things, which I suppose is the scientific thing to do. Some day…

I use a Bach Megatone 7C that I had some of the outer metal taken off. It’s lighter than a Megatone and a little heavier than a regular model. Tried a bunch of different mouthpieces and that works the best for me and my horn . The Alto is a Weril (.500 bore) with tuning in the slide

There are two pieces that I have liked lately on alto - the marcinkiewicz ET2 McDougall and the Greg black NY Legend 6M. Both have around .228 bore, shallow cups and feel good. Total amateur over here, but I’m having fun with them.