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Re: Mellophones

To: <brass-band@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: Mellophones
From: Tom Warner <tom@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Tue, 18 Apr 2000 17:36:51 +0100
In-reply-to: <38FB948F.BB792D2C@seaside.net>
Priority: low
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User-agent: Microsoft-Outlook-Express-Macintosh-Edition/5.02.2022

on 17/4/00 11:47 pm, Bill Walker at Walker@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:

> Now there's another instrument that has me interested too, it looks like
> a contrabass saxophone but actually uses a baritone type mouthpiece.
> It was being played in an Eastern European Band.

I think you may be referring to an Ophicleide. Here are a couple of links:

http://www.contrabass.com/pages/ophicleide.html

http://www.neillins.com/ophiclei.htm

I saw some used in anger last summer (on TV) by, I think,  the BBC Symphony
Orchestra.

There is a regular poster to one of the horn mailinglists who goes by the
name of Prof. Cabbage.

I understand his performances are very entertaining and I hope he comes to
England sometime soon.

He is sometimes moved to poetry and wrote the following about the
Ophicleide:

----
I recently noticed that various people chose to debase the
intellectual level of the hornlist by discussing farting.

Not only was I appalled and disgusted, but I was extremely anxious to
contribute.

Then appeared a closely related musical topic, the
Ophicleide.  So I offer a brief history of this instrument.

     THE OPHICLEIDE

The Ophicleide, like mortal sin,
     Was fostered by the serpent.
Its pitch was vague; its tone was din;
    Its timbre, rude and burpant.

Composers, in a secret vote,
     Declared its sound non grata;
And that's why Wagner never wrote
     An Ophicleide Sonata.

Thus spurned, it soon became defunct,
     To gross neglect succumbing;
A few were pawned, but most were junked
     Or used for indoor plumbing.

And so this ill wind, badly blown,
     Has now completely vanished:
I nominate the saxophone
     To be the next one banished.

Farewell, offensive Ophicleide,
     Your epitaph is chiseled:
"I died of ophicleidicide:
     I tried, alas, but fizzled!"

Gotta go,
Cabbage

--

References:
- Mellophones
  - From: Bill Walker

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