Tuba Instruments
Tuba Instruments Fast Facts
Properly speaking, the tuba is not one instrument but a whole family ranging from tenor to contrabass sizes. They first appeared in German military bands in the 1820’s but nobody seems to know who invented them. They are in effect, large bugles, equipped with valves. They have a wide conical bore, which expands into a large flared bell. They are held with the bell pointing upwards. Orchestral tubas come in five sizes: the 9ft (274cm) B flat, the 12ft (366cm) F, the 14ft (427cm) E flat, the 16ft (488cm) C, and the 18ft (549cm) B flat. A player selects whichever seems best suited to the music they have to play. The most generally used is the 12ft tuba in F.
A Brief History of the Tuba
The name tuba referred originally to the Roman war horn. The history of the tuba is a short one, but the multiplicity of types and names is such that even the Oxford Companion to Music admits that to define ‘tuba’ is impossible.
Those who seek clarification will discover that some tubas are held inclined to the left shoulder and some to the right. Moreover some drawings and photographs display the instrument lying horizontal, others plunked disgracefully upside down. There are, or have been, 9-foot, 12-foot, 14-foot and 16-foot tubas and one called the BBB flat contrabass standing nine feet high with some 36 feet of tubing, a nightmare for several plumbers. What provoked the development of this unruly tribe of low pitched brass instruments was the invention of the valve in the early 19th century.
Large keyed bugle horns, a crossbreed between horns
and trumpets, were difficult to play well and had a number of weak and
out-of-tune notes; this was due partly to the wide spacing and large diameter
of the key holes in the long tube. Once the valve was invented it was
possible to fold that long tubing neatly and scientifically, to bore it
with holes of equal diameter and to fit them with hermetically sealing
valves. While composers complained that the application of valves to the
French horn, the trumpet and in particular the trombone impaired the characteristic
timbre, in this case there were no real compar5isons to be made and they
were glad to have this new, lowest-of-all sounding instrument that would
gradually replace the ophicleide (a large form of keyed bugle) and the
serpent (also keyed, its length compressed by a series of wriggles).
Tubas in various sizes were made from about 1835 onwards to a
specification of trombonist Wilhelm Wieprecht, bandmaster of the Prussian
Dragoon Guards, but it was not until late in the century that they were
to be seen and heard in the orchestra. Then, as indeed now, their most
common use was in military and brass bands, where they assumed a number
of different shapes. Probably the best-known ‘special’ variety is the
Sousaphone, which is built to the specification of John Philip Sousa in
circular form with the huge bell facing forwards.
In orchestral music oval-shaped tubas called Wagner Tuben are sometimes used. These use a horn mouthpiece, and were developed by the Bohemian firm of instrument makers called Cerveny, and then reinvented some thirty years later by Wagner, who wanted a timbre somewhere between that of a true tuba and horn in the operatic cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen. The Wagner Tuben have been scored for by other composers since Wagner, including Bruckner and Stravinsky. The usual tubs to be seen in the orchestra are the tenor and or bass.
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