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Feeling Very Lucky (Shires Trumpet)


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trickg
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PostPosted: Sat Jun 12, 2021 6:09 pm    Post subject: Feeling Very Lucky (Shires Trumpet) Reply with quote

Today I took home a brand new Shires trumpet with a B bell.

I didn't pay a cent for this trumpet, but it's mine for the foreseeable future.

Basically as the trumpet section leader for my Guard band, when I was approached to suggest some new trumpets to replace the ones the band bought about close to 20 years ago, I talked things over with the trumpet section for suggestions and submitted some wish lists of sorts - tiered based on price and availability. I put Shires on the list after having played them a few years back and being really taken with their ease of blow and sound.

Well, the unit got a brand new Shires B, and I snagged it out of supply today. (They also have a Yamaha Xeno Chicago on the way - the rest will be standard Xenos.)

Gotta say, it's a really really nice horn to play. I know that there will have to be an acclimation process, but fiddling with it tonight, the tone really sings and it's a bit more agile than my Jupiter 1600I I've been playing for the last 5 years or so. I think I'm really going to enjoy it.

I'm probably not going to want to give it back when I retire in a couple of years, but I've got it now, and that's good enough for me.

On a side note, I specifically chose the B bell. I know that the A bell is popular, but it compares to the Bach 37 bell, and I have come to the belief that I gravitate toward a broader sound concept in my head than the A bell would have produced. Maybe. In any case, that's why I chose the B bell, and so far I'm not disappointed in the least. (This is based on a thread that Kenny at Shires posted in regarding the Shires line of trumpets - he said that in basic terms, the bells kind of compare as A=37, B=43, C=72)

https://www.trumpetherald.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1509533

Also, it comes in a really nice, compact Marcus Bona double trumpet case, and a Shires 3C. (Made by Pickett) The mouthpiece plays nicely, but I'm not sure I'll switch to it. Not while I'm trying to acclimate to the horn itself - one thing at a time.

That's basically it - I just wanted to share my luck and good fortune.

Are there any other Shires B bell players out there who might have some insight as to what to expect?
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Grits Burgh
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PostPosted: Sat Jun 12, 2021 6:49 pm    Post subject: Re: Feeling Very Lucky (Shires Trumpet) Reply with quote

trickg wrote:
That's basically it - I just wanted to share my luck and good fortune.


It's good to be you.

Enjoy.

Warm regards,
Grits
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Goby
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PostPosted: Sat Jun 12, 2021 9:59 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

The B is on the lighter end of the spectrum right? I have a Model A and it has a ton of nickel trim, and is in fact the heaviest horn I own. I like it more than any Bach 37 I've played. I'd love to try out the other models of Shires and compare them side by side with some nice Bachs. Congrats on your acquisition!
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Crazy Finn
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PostPosted: Sun Jun 13, 2021 1:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Goby wrote:
The B is on the lighter end of the spectrum right? I have a Model A and it has a ton of nickel trim, and is in fact the heaviest horn I own. I like it more than any Bach 37 I've played. I'd love to try out the other models of Shires and compare them side by side with some nice Bachs. Congrats on your acquisition!

The B isn't necessarily lighter but maybe... broader?

43 vs 37 ish.

I like the B, I like the C, more.

Maybe someday....
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trickg
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PostPosted: Sun Jun 13, 2021 6:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Goby wrote:
The B is on the lighter end of the spectrum right? I have a Model A and it has a ton of nickel trim, and is in fact the heaviest horn I own. I like it more than any Bach 37 I've played. I'd love to try out the other models of Shires and compare them side by side with some nice Bachs. Congrats on your acquisition!

I don't see this Shires as being heavy, but then again the Jupiter 1600i isn't exactly a lightweight trumpet. It seems lighter than the Jupiter.
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Dayton
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PostPosted: Sun Jun 13, 2021 12:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Congratulations! Shires makes terrific horns.
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ebolton
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PostPosted: Sun Jun 13, 2021 2:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Congratulations! And props for serving in the Guard.
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trickg
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2021 5:19 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Dayton wrote:
Congratulations! Shires makes terrific horns.

ebolton wrote:
Congratulations! And props for serving in the Guard.

Thanks! My time in the Army band program has been a long winding road with a couple of detours along the way, but I'm quickly approaching a point where I'll have earned a retirement, so it's not completely selfless service.

I put the Shires through its paces last night. Rather than just fiddling and noodling, or even playing exercises, one of the things I like to do is to play with recordings - SO much can be found on Youtube these days that it's not hard to find recordings to play with. While a recording is not as good as actually rehearsing with your ensemble, it is, IMO, the next best thing because you have to listen for and match intonation, phrasing, inflection, tempos, articulation, etc.

I have a bunch of Brass Quintet charts and I ran through a bunch of those.

This Shires is really a pretty remarkable trumpet. It's so focused, and speaks so easily, getting clean, soft and accurate attacks are markedly easier, and likewise, being able to play controlled at a soft volume is also markedly easier.

Intonation is different in a couple of places than on the Jupiter. One of the things that I always found annoying with the 1600i was how low the 4th line D was, and the top line F wasn't centered. On the Shires, the D is much better, and the F just pops - everything is centered on this horn.

With that said, the low D and C# are pretty high - I found that I had to throw the slide a good bit further on those notes than I did with the Jupiter - that's ok though. I can live with that.

I know that right now this is Honeymoon phase - I fully expect there to come a point where things fall apart for a week or so, but man, it sure was fun to play last night.
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Jerry
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2021 6:06 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

trickg wrote:
With that said, the low D and C# are pretty high -

Out of curiosity, how is the low E? Do you need to kick out the first slide to get it in tune?

Thanks.
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patdublc
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2021 9:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

My favorite trumpet is - wait, what day is it? But, having said that, there are maybe 3 that that stand out. One of them is a very early Shires BLWS model. It does everything well. With the right choice of mouthpiece, I can play it anywhere for any kind of music.
My favorite feature of the BLWS is that is has the most versatile color pallet of any horn that I have ever played. I like that. I like my horn to produce the sound that is in my head and this horn makes it very easy.[/youtube]
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OldSchoolEuph
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2021 10:13 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

patdublc wrote:
I like my horn to produce the sound that is in my head and this horn makes it very easy.


This is what its all about. I don't care if its a Mendini (just buy a pallet of spares if it is), what matters is that it works for the player.

That your best fit also seems to be preserving jobs in the US is a very nice bonus.
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trickg
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 14, 2021 11:01 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Jerry wrote:
trickg wrote:
With that said, the low D and C# are pretty high -

Out of curiosity, how is the low E? Do you need to kick out the first slide to get it in tune?

Thanks.

Not that I've taken note of - it's possible that it's close enough that I can lip it in without thinking about it too much.

I'll look for that specifically the next time I'm in the practice room.
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trickg
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PostPosted: Tue Jun 15, 2021 6:15 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I figured I'd update this thread - I've been putting this horn through its paces, doing my part to acclimate to it.

I'm blown away by how easy it is to play softly on this trumpet. I don't think I've ever played a trumpet this responsive. My Schilke B6 was also super responsive, but I never had the kind of slotting and control with that horn that I seem to have on demand with this one.

It's kind of hard to put down - it reminds me of when I first moved up from the battered King student model cornet to the Yamaha 739T. By comparison that trumpet was just so easy to play, and I get that same kind of feeling with this.

One thing that I do find interesting is the valve block - the valves are spaced a bit closer together on this trumpet - that's taking some getting used to.

The sound is also easy to color. I think that the Shires website refers to the B model that "jazz and classical players alike love the breadth and malleability of the sound." Seems pretty accurate.

I wonder if I'm going to have issues with being too bright - I naturally have a pretty bright sound, and I hope that this horn doesn't hurt me in that area.
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OldSchoolEuph
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PostPosted: Wed Jun 16, 2021 2:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

If I am remembering right, you were playing a 1600i (?)

From what I have read (and noted relative to the horns I have), Jupiter XO horns are at the bright end of the scale. Would you agree with those perceptions, and say the Shires B is even brighter (which I think is supposed to be not as bright as either of the A bell forms)?

I'm wondering what that would say about the original A.
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trickg
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PostPosted: Wed Jun 16, 2021 4:14 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

OldSchoolEuph wrote:
If I am remembering right, you were playing a 1600i (?)

From what I have read (and noted relative to the horns I have), Jupiter XO horns are at the bright end of the scale. Would you agree with those perceptions, and say the Shires B is even brighter (which I think is supposed to be not as bright as either of the A bell forms)?

I'm wondering what that would say about the original A.

Yep - you remembered correctly - I am coming from Jupiter 1600i.

The sound of this trumpet is pretty easy to color - surprisingly so. I don't know if I'd have been happier with the A bell or not, but given my experiences over the last handful of years trying to go back to a Bach 37, I made a deliberate choice for the B/43 bell. With the 37s, I always felt like I was trying to push them to have a different/broader sound.

I'll have an opportunity to play it with an ensemble tomorrow - so we'll see how it stacks up then. That's really going to be a better test than playing isolated in a practice room.

On a side note, someone asked about the low E. It's a touch high, but usually I can lip it down, or kick the slide just a touch if I need to hold it for a bit.
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Riojazz
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PostPosted: Sat Jun 19, 2021 4:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Nice find.

I had a tour of the Shires factory when I bought mine (a medium bore Destino III that plays like butter).
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JayKosta
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PostPosted: Wed Sep 29, 2021 10:22 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Interesting article about Shires -
https://www.cnet.com/features/horn-in-the-usa-building-better-brass-instruments-one-part-at-a-time/
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OldSchoolEuph
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 30, 2021 8:32 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

So after everyone jumped all over me last year for saying that Eastman did not build Shires instruments entirely in the US, that components were coming from Eastman's China facilities - here it is in black and white.

"Bent parts" = slides, bows, a lot of the horn.

And to hear that Steve Shires, who not everyone realizes also has great skill at leveraging Chinese manufacturing with superior designs engineered to those methods, has quit? That says even more.

Shires is not Shires anymore. It's Eastman. (and a much weaker Eastman across the range without Shires' design skills)

The US facility doing QC and correction for what Eastman factories make: that is nothing short of walking on water. What comes from Eastman's factories is a mess! If you have not seen it first-hand, as I have, you cannot imagine.
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trickg
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 30, 2021 9:30 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

OldSchoolEuph wrote:
So after everyone jumped all over me last year for saying that Eastman did not build Shires instruments entirely in the US, that components were coming from Eastman's China facilities - here it is in black and white.

"Bent parts" = slides, bows, a lot of the horn.

And to hear that Steve Shires, who not everyone realizes also has great skill at leveraging Chinese manufacturing with superior designs engineered to those methods, has quit? That says even more.

Shires is not Shires anymore. It's Eastman. (and a much weaker Eastman across the range without Shires' design skills)

The US facility doing QC and correction for what Eastman factories make: that is nothing short of walking on water. What comes from Eastman's factories is a mess! If you have not seen it first-hand, as I have, you cannot imagine.

I couldn't give a rip about the ins and outs of the manufacture as long as it plays well, and this horn plays really well.

Dude, why do you have to crap all over my thread?
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Subtropical and Subpar
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PostPosted: Thu Sep 30, 2021 10:08 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

OldSchoolEuph wrote:
So after everyone jumped all over me last year for saying that Eastman did not build Shires instruments entirely in the US, that components were coming from Eastman's China facilities - here it is in black and white.

"Bent parts" = slides, bows, a lot of the horn.

And to hear that Steve Shires, who not everyone realizes also has great skill at leveraging Chinese manufacturing with superior designs engineered to those methods, has quit? That says even more.

Shires is not Shires anymore. It's Eastman. (and a much weaker Eastman across the range without Shires' design skills)

The US facility doing QC and correction for what Eastman factories make: that is nothing short of walking on water. What comes from Eastman's factories is a mess! If you have not seen it first-hand, as I have, you cannot imagine.


And the article also at least implies that Shires making all of their parts in-house was one of the reasons its finances collapsed a decade ago. And lo and behold, the article also notes that Bach's intermediate lines - the equivalent of Shires' Q horns - use some foreign parts and some of Yamaha's instrument manufacturing is in Indonesia. So goes one, so goes all. Frankly given that Conn-Selmer is owned Steinway, which in turn is owned by the hedge fund Paulson & Co., I suspect we'll see a lot more overseas sourcing for Conn-Selmer in the future. Paulson's MO is to buy distressed assets and restructure them, i.e. lower costs by any means necessary. Heck, Steinway has three brands of pianos - Steinway, Boston, Essex - and two are entirely made in Asia. Some of the Asia-made Boston pianos cost around $50,000.

As always, the best horn is the horn that is best for the given player. If playtest a Bach and a Shires or a Getzen and a Yamaha or a Carolbrass and a Schagerl, or a Monette and a pTrumpet, get the one that you like best, that is the easiest for you to play, that you sound best on. It's very simple. Not knowing whether the second valve slide was built in Elkhart or Tianjin shouldn't really come into it.

"What comes from Eastman's factories is a mess!"

Even assuming this statement is true, it's funny that, for example, certain posters don't give Bach this sort of flack for, you know, the wild inconsistencies in its mouthpieces for decades and decades. Or the inconsistent overall quality of its trumpets in the 90s and 00s. Those were made with all American parts from a plant I would presume this poster would not call "a mess," yet the standard advice for buyers was to playtest at least three to five Bachs, so shoddy was the QC on their final product. On the contrary, I have never heard nor read anyone complain about a poorly made Shires. Of course, QC is more easily accomplished when one is only making 400 horns a year, as is the case with Shires' flagship horns per the article, than the gazillions of Bachs a year. (per Wiki the Bach serial numbers go from 110,000 to 525,000 from 1975 to 2010, which averages out to around 12,000 horns a year).

Anyhow it all seems a bit much to get so worked up about where the second valve slides are made for one boutique trumpet maker whose annual professional trumpet production numbers (400) are closer to Monette (four or five dozen?) than Schilke (1,250).
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