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jimmysmith76
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 Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 4:05 am Post subject: Flugelhorn intonation |
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So I have a Calicchio Copper Flugel that I really love. It has a really beautiful sound, over all, it is a fantastic horn. My problem with it is that the second line G plays really flat. Like 20 cents flat.... Other than that the horn plays in tune with itself.
Does anyone have experience with a flugel doing this? Is there something I can do to get that note up in tune? I know there are a couple people that make flugel leadpipes, do those work to fix a problem like this?
I have a Signet flugel that I have as a back up, the G on this horn is fine. I find myself playing this horn more than the Calicchio. I don't want that to be the case.
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shofarguy
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 4:53 am Post subject: |
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There are a few things that I have run into that make a flugelhorn play out of tune. The first one is the bell branch, according to Byron Autrey. Byron is the one who developed a mathematical formula for the taper of the branch that solved the intonation problems of the flugelhorn. It is quite critical.
The second thing is the mouthpiece chosen. Some mouthpieces are too long or have the wrong shank taper for the horn and make it impossible for the player to tune the horn up to pitch. Some are too deep for certain players to be able to play them up to pitch.
This leads to the third cause and that is the player's technique. One such player I know played high in the note center on his Bach, which is not atypical, and did the same thing with his flugelhorn. He pinched off the notes as he ascended the scale to the top of the staff. However, he relaxed his embouchure as he descended; I could hear his tone open up and become noticeably more rich and vibrant. Playing this way caused the natural partials to be out of tune with each other. When I played his instrument, I found it to play quite in tune.
Callicchio has a good reputation for quality instruments and I suspect that there should be no inherent problem with the horn, though I've never played one. If it were me, I would first find a good player that knows how to listen and I would have them try to assess my playing. If they can cite an issue there, I'd work on my technique.
Second, I'd try some different mouthpieces and see if the one I was using conflicted with the horn, for whatever reason. Then, I'd try different horns to see if mine was the problem. I'd also have a tech check out the valve alignment.
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jimmysmith76
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 6:03 am Post subject: |
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I will check the valve alignment. I have tried several different mouthpieces and several different people have played it. Everyone seems to have the same problem on this horn.
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Morogan
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 8:01 am Post subject: |
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| shofarguy wrote: | | There are a few things that I have run into that make a flugelhorn play out of tune. The first one is the bell branch, according to Byron Autrey. Byron is the one who developed a mathematical formula for the taper of the branch that solved the intonation problems of the flugelhorn. It is quite critical. |
I'd love to know more about Autrey's work on this (it's the engineer in me). Do you happen to have a link to his work?
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trickg
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 8:10 am Post subject: |
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If you pull the first valve slide just a touch it will bring the adjacent F and A down a touch and will make those pitches closer to G relatively.
You might also be able to improve the intonation a bit with a different mouthpiece.
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shofarguy
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 8:42 am Post subject: |
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| Morogan wrote: | | shofarguy wrote: | | There are a few things that I have run into that make a flugelhorn play out of tune. The first one is the bell branch, according to Byron Autrey. Byron is the one who developed a mathematical formula for the taper of the branch that solved the intonation problems of the flugelhorn. It is quite critical. |
I'd love to know more about Autrey's work on this (it's the engineer in me). Do you happen to have a link to his work? |
It's been 8 years since I had those conversations with Byron, but what I remember is that he worked on the bell branch in the 1970s and/or 1980s. The result culminated in Kanstul's 1525 and 925.
Kanstul describes the progress from the Benge 3X flugelhorns to the 1525 as centering around the diminished bore. Flip Oakes talks about specifying the components and valve tube lengths for those horns. But, it was Byron who developed the bell branch formula. So, my best link to his work is Kanstul. Zig, of course, is gone, but Mark, Jack and Troy would probably know a lot about the history.
Getzen may also have some record, as Byron has consulted with them over the years, too. There was a story Byron tells of flugelhorn intonation problems there. The prototype he had built for them played very well, but the production horns were not in tune. He eventually found that the technicians at Getzen were cutting the bell branch 5/8" away from the correct diameter and it was wreaking havoc on the results. They needed to use a different technique to locate the proper trimming point. One solved, Getzen's flugelhorn played as they were intended.
Back to Kanstul, I know Zig always kept the tooling he developed for his own and for customers' instruments. I can imagine that many of the Western World's instrument makers purchase bell branches from them, or have consulted with them to develop their own. Zig was good that way with somethings.
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Flip Oakes Wild Thing Bb Trumpet in copper
Flip Oakes Wild Thing Flugelhorn in copper
There is one reason that I practice: to be ready at the downbeat when the final trumpet sounds. |
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Morogan
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 11:54 am Post subject: |
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| shofarguy wrote: | It's been 8 years since I had those conversations with Byron, but what I remember is that he worked on the bell branch in the 1970s and/or 1980s. The result culminated in Kanstul's 1525 and 925.
Kanstul describes the progress from the Benge 3X flugelhorns to the 1525 as centering around the diminished bore. Flip Oakes talks about specifying the components and valve tube lengths for those horns. But, it was Byron who developed the bell branch formula. So, my best link to his work is Kanstul. Zig, of course, is gone, but Mark, Jack and Troy would probably know a lot about the history.
Getzen may also have some record, as Byron has consulted with them over the years, too. There was a story Byron tells of flugelhorn intonation problems there. The prototype he had built for them played very well, but the production horns were not in tune. He eventually found that the technicians at Getzen were cutting the bell branch 5/8" away from the correct diameter and it was wreaking havoc on the results. They needed to use a different technique to locate the proper trimming point. One solved, Getzen's flugelhorn played as they were intended.
Back to Kanstul, I know Zig always kept the tooling he developed for his own and for customers' instruments. I can imagine that many of the Western World's instrument makers purchase bell branches from them, or have consulted with them to develop their own. Zig was good that way with somethings. |
Man, that is great stuff. I remember playing a four-valve Getzen in 1983 or so, and that 4th valve was practically a requirement. After being away from brass for about 20 years, I come back and low-and-behold, flugelhorns have gone through a dramatic improvement in intonation and you don't really have to fear three valves. I recently picked up a 2010 XO 1646L that doesn't seem to have any issues worse than many trumpets. I suppose we all have Mr. Autrey to thank.
I appreciate your relaying what you know. Thanks!
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p76
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 1:36 pm Post subject: |
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They are a difficult beast, flugels.... I had all sorts of problems with my 1525, and spoke to Jack Kanstul. He pointed out that the bore and throat of the mpc I was using was probably too big for that horn (and my ability  ) , and suggested something tighter.
It worked wonders. Of course that may not be the answer for you.
Cheers,
Roger
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shofarguy
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 2:01 pm Post subject: |
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| p76 wrote: | They are a difficult beast, flugels.... I had all sorts of problems with my 1525, and spoke to Jack Kanstul. He pointed out that the bore and throat of the mpc I was using was probably too big for that horn (and my ability ) , and suggested something tighter.
It worked wonders. Of course that may not be the answer for you.
Cheers,
Roger |
I haven't ever really gotten along with the 1525. I did get the chance to play the very first prototype that Flip received back from the Art Farmer estate after he passed. It had the French taper mouth pipe and of course Flip had given it his total enhancement. It played noticeably better than stock, but wasn't as easy as either the 1025 or Wild Thing.
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Brian A. Douglas
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p76
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 2:26 pm Post subject: |
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Mine is one of the (more common) Bach taper versions. I came onto it from a Weril Regium, which is a large bore standard shank flugel, which was an easy switch from trumpet. The 1525 is more of a "true" flugel than the Weril, and you really need to be in the flugel mindset to get the best out of it. Such a great sound when you get it right, but, for me anyway, concentration is required to get there.
Cheers,
Roger
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jimmysmith76
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 3:59 pm Post subject: |
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So I pulled out all my flugel mouthpieces. The one I was using was very deep, the G is much better in tune with a standard flugel cup mouthpiece. I can live with this now!
I also checked the valve alignment and it was slightly off. I replaced both sets of felts and that locked it in even more. I guess I need to keep up on replacing the felts more often.
Thanks for he help
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dr_trumpet
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| Posted: Mon Oct 16, 2017 6:08 pm Post subject: |
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| jimmysmith76 wrote: | So I pulled out all my flugel mouthpieces. The one I was using was very deep, the G is much better in tune with a standard flugel cup mouthpiece. I can live with this now!
I also checked the valve alignment and it was slightly off. I replaced both sets of felts and that locked it in even more. I guess I need to keep up on replacing the felts more often.
Thanks for he help |
Amazing what a few minute differences will do with the horn, isn't it? I found after much trial and money, the best mouthpiece for me with my Conn Vintage One was the 3FL that came with it. Now I have a collection of top-end pieces (Monettes, Bachs, CKB in gold, Stork, et. al), and the best one for the horn was the original one (that I now have gold plated).
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iiipopes
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| Posted: Tue Oct 17, 2017 5:52 am Post subject: |
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I agree with all the above. My Couesnon plays well in tune. It has a good taper to the bell. I have two contemporary to the horn Couesnon mouthpieces that are not too deep: one for a clearer section tone and one for a more smokey solo tone.
I pull the first valve slide a hair and the 3rd valve slide about 3/8 inch and set them. Intonation is good across the registers.
Because I have mouthpieces with a tighter cup, throat and backbore, intonation is good all the way up. With everybody else's mouthpieces, with deep cups and open throats and backbores, everything went really flat above top of staff G. Is my tone as beezelbub black as seems to be the fad currently? No. But I don't want that. The right overtones add piquancy and complexity to the traditional flugel tone that the denizens of the deep tone give up.
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Tony Scodwell
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| Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2017 8:31 am Post subject: Flugel intonation |
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When I was playing on my (very good) Couesnon, it got me to thinking what I could do to make it better in so far as clarity of sound and yes, intonation. With the backing of Don Getzen and his DEG company, I put some prototypes together with the lower tuning branch design I felt would help with intonation. The Couesnon had too much pull on the leadpipe to play where it needed to be and I surmised adding length after the valves instead of before might be an advantage there. Don had a mandrel copied from the Selmer Clark Terry played on for many years and we started with that. I always loved the Besson flugel so the leadpipe was similar to that. The lower tuning branch (primary tuning) was quite difficult to get correct and when the two lengths of the inner and outer slides weren't correct, intonation got wacky. It took several permutations before it came together and the result was not only fabulous intonation, the sound quality cleared up dramatically while keeping the rich, dark quality I wanted. Bauerfeind valves were used and DEG produced these horns for a few years before deciding to not make brass instruments any longer. I changed the valves to Kanstul made Bessons and gave the tuning branch an inner and outer configuration which helped even more which is now the Scodwell USA flugelhorn I produce. Check out the video on my website with Rocky Lombardo and me.
Tony Scodwell
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iiipopes
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| Posted: Tue Oct 31, 2017 12:50 pm Post subject: Re: Flugel intonation |
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| Tony Scodwell wrote: | When I was playing on my (very good) Couesnon, it got me to thinking what I could do to make it better in so far as clarity of sound and yes, intonation. With the backing of Don Getzen and his DEG company, I put some prototypes together with the lower tuning branch design I felt would help with intonation. The Couesnon had too much pull on the leadpipe to play where it needed to be and I surmised adding length after the valves instead of before might be an advantage there. Don had a mandrel copied from the Selmer Clark Terry played on for many years and we started with that. I always loved the Besson flugel so the leadpipe was similar to that. The lower tuning branch (primary tuning) was quite difficult to get correct and when the two lengths of the inner and outer slides weren't correct, intonation got wacky. It took several permutations before it came together and the result was not only fabulous intonation, the sound quality cleared up dramatically while keeping the rich, dark quality I wanted. Bauerfeind valves were used and DEG produced these horns for a few years before deciding to not make brass instruments any longer. I changed the valves to Kanstul made Bessons and gave the tuning branch an inner and outer configuration which helped even more which is now the Scodwell USA flugelhorn I produce. Check out the video on my website with Rocky Lombardo and me.
Tony Scodwell
www.scodwellusa.com |
That makes perfect sense to me. My Couesnon at some point had a train wreck, from the looks of it many, many years before I got it, and both the inner and outer lead pipes were replaced. Well, who knows why, but when I compared the length of the lead pipes to friends' Couesnons, my outer lead pipe was shorter, and when I cross-referenced the stamped number in the receiver to old catalogs, it appears I got a Eb soprano lead pipe! Of course, that means I have to pull it out a little more for tuning, and probably by accident along with the proprietary mouthpieces, this gives just the right step up to the lead pipe bore to help it stay in tune better. Yes, Flugels are strange beasts, indeed!
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debugjaws
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| Posted: Tue Nov 07, 2017 1:45 pm Post subject: |
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I've owned a Couesnon, a Yamaha 731, and now a Marcinkiewicz Rembrandt (4 years). The Marcinkiewicz, aside from being a beautiful gold plated piece of art plays incredibly in tune in all registers and all valve combinations. Joe claims that due to the shepherds crook tuning slide (one of three SC's on the horn) versus a lead-pipe slide you will never need a third or first valve trigger again. He is certainly correct about that (see link below). Given the bore and size it takes some serious air to fill it, but once you've conditioned yourself to playing that large, the sound is far beyond anything I've played before. It is by far my favorite horn that I've ever owned, even beating out my Marcinkiewicz (now Vermeer) custom b flat that I had Joe make 25 years ago ... and that's saying something!
https://www.marcinkiewicz.com/instruments/flugel-horns/standard/
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qcm
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| Posted: Tue Nov 07, 2017 6:55 pm Post subject: Re: Flugelhorn intonation |
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| jimmysmith76 wrote: | | Is there something I can do to get that note up in tune? I know there are a couple people that make flugel leadpipes, do those work to fix a problem like this? |
Have you tried an alternate fingering of 1 and 3?
Perhaps that's the simplest and easiest solution?
-Dave
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jimmysmith76
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| Posted: Fri Nov 10, 2017 8:48 am Post subject: |
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I wound up getting a flugelhorn mouthpiece with a more traditional cup. The piece I was playing on was very deep. With the larger bell the deeper mouthpiece was not the best fit. The new piece is working great.
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oregonmac
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| Posted: Sat Dec 09, 2017 6:42 am Post subject: |
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I have an early Eclipse flugel and was playing on a Wick deep V mouthpiece. I kept pulling notes sharp because I was used to having to lip up, and with that mouthpiece I was all over the place. I got Jon at Monette to turn a new mouthpiece, then brought the horn in and had him adjust it for the gap (about an hour of fiddling to get it just right). The note targets got noticeably bigger and I found I could relax into them much more easily.
I’m fortunate to live an hour away from Dave’s shop, but adjusting the taper of the mouthpiece to the shank made a huge difference.
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RandyTX
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| Posted: Sat Dec 09, 2017 10:45 am Post subject: |
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A lot of it is (obviously) dependent upon the model of flugel you have. You probably will have to experiment more with mouthpieces, leadpipe options, etc. than you would with a trumpet or cornet.
I'm quite happy with the tuning on my flugel as I have it set up right now. It has a 3rd slide trigger for C# and D, but no adjustment on 1st.
Occasionally I'll play a bottom line E third valve to bring it down a bit (depending on the key of the piece and where it lands in the chord) but other than that, I don't have to use alternate fingerings.
It was a little bit pitchier before I had a valve alignment done and switched to a french taper leadpipe.
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