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yourbrass Heavyweight Member
Joined: 12 Jun 2011 Posts: 3632 Location: Pacifica, CA, USA
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Posted: Tue Jun 15, 2021 7:40 pm Post subject: N.Y. Calicchio, ca. 1931 |
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Another "pandemic project" completed:
This Calicchio trumpet from I believe, about 1931, has been restored and lacquered. Thanks to Tom Green of Green's Buffing in Elkhart, IN for the excellent cleanup and lacquer work. The rest of the overhaul was my doing.
The first slide is the only quick-tuning on the horn, this was what Calicchio did to one extent or another w/his early instruments. Before WWII, it was common for trumpets and cornets to have no 3rd slide throw. They would compensate by having a slightly longer 3rd slide for low D and Db.
Why do I say 1931 as a date of manufacture?
The serial number doesn't correspond to any subsequent Calicchio number. I've looked at half a dozen serial numbers from my friend John Worley's collection of Wm. Frank's instruments, and they do not agree in position and type font with this serial no. However, this font looks like the one that Calicchio used until his demise in 1979.
I believe that it is a date of manufacture, as Schilke did in his early days as a maker. I'll stick to that theory until new information emerges.
How does it play?
It is really a horn of its day - if I put a typical mouthpiece in that I use on my Benge, it sounds like a duck - extremely nasal and weird. I got out my Pickett 3C top and the ACB Mt Vernon copy backbore and it is a lot better. But it still sounds, to some extent, like your putting a cup, or megaphone, on the sound coming out of the bell. Hard to describe.
More pics here, and please turn on comments to see mine:
https://www.smugmug.com/app/organize/NY-Calicchio-ca-1931?nick=lionelemde _________________ "Strive for tone." -John Coppola
Edwards X-13
ACB MV3C /ACB A1/26 backbore
https://yourbrass.com/ |
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blbaumgarn Heavyweight Member
Joined: 26 Jul 2017 Posts: 705
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Posted: Tue Jun 15, 2021 7:49 pm Post subject: N.Y. Calicchio, c.a. 1931 |
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Congratulations on some fine work. A fine piece of trumpet history. _________________ "There are two sides to a trumpeter's personality,
there is one that lives to lay waste to woodwinds and strings, leaving them lie blue and lifeless along a swath of destruction that is a
trumpeter's fury-then there is the dark side!" Irving Bush |
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OldSchoolEuph Heavyweight Member
Joined: 07 Apr 2012 Posts: 2440
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Posted: Wed Jun 16, 2021 3:25 am Post subject: Re: N.Y. Calicchio, ca. 1931 |
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yourbrass wrote: | It is really a horn of its day - if I put a typical mouthpiece in that I use on my Benge, it sounds like a duck - extremely nasal and weird. |
Beautiful work. It's a museum piece.
Your description got me thinking so looked to see what horns I have that were designed & built around that time give or take a couple years.
I did find the Indian Chieftain, White's awful Student Prince peashooter and the York USA line trumpet that sounds like a duck being stepped on, but I also found the Selmer Grand Prix, Martin Handcraft Imperial, Holton Model 30, and King Liberty #2 Silvertone - all horns still well regarded today that may have a darker, less brilliant period tone, but have their uses - and certainly don't quack.
It seems odd that Calicchio could have built a company on horns that were not up to the tonal standards of the 4 I just mentioned that debuted between 1930 and 1932. _________________ Ron Berndt
www.trumpet-history.com
2017 Austin Winds Stage 466
1962 Mt. Vernon Bach 43
1954 Holton 49 Stratodyne
1927 Conn 22B
1957 Holton 27 cornet
1985 Yamaha YEP-621
1975 Yamaha YEP-321 Custom
1965 Besson Baritone
1975 Olds Recording R-20 |
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fblues Regular Member
Joined: 04 Mar 2017 Posts: 88 Location: Bethlehem, PA
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Posted: Wed Jun 16, 2021 4:13 am Post subject: |
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This is indeed a beautiful horn!
It is quite interesting because I have a Calicchio trumpet (Serial #:1390) that was made in LA.
I guess that the company moved to the west during that period of time.
https://imgur.com/a/LGPARLL |
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yourbrass Heavyweight Member
Joined: 12 Jun 2011 Posts: 3632 Location: Pacifica, CA, USA
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Posted: Wed Jun 16, 2021 7:28 am Post subject: Re: N.Y. Calicchio, ca. 1931 |
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OldSchoolEuph wrote: | yourbrass wrote: | It is really a horn of its day - if I put a typical mouthpiece in that I use on my Benge, it sounds like a duck - extremely nasal and weird. |
Beautiful work. It's a museum piece.
Your description got me thinking so looked to see what horns I have that were designed & built around that time give or take a couple years.
I did find the Indian Chieftain, White's awful Student Prince peashooter and the York USA line trumpet that sounds like a duck being stepped on, but I also found the Selmer Grand Prix, Martin Handcraft Imperial, Holton Model 30, and King Liberty #2 Silvertone - all horns still well regarded today that may have a darker, less brilliant period tone, but have their uses - and certainly don't quack.
It seems odd that Calicchio could have built a company on horns that were not up to the tonal standards of the 4 I just mentioned that debuted between 1930 and 1932. |
Thank you, Ron. The bell is tempered super-hard, it's as hard as a YTR2320, which was a very hard and brittle bell. I wonder if that doesn't affect tone quality. Other parts are unusual- the leadpipe is 9 1/8" long and fairly tight in bore, like a small Benge pipe. The tuning crook is really crude, definitely hand-made. And there's the Wm. Frank valve section, which has various bores of knuckles coming out of it, no particular logic I could discern.
-Lionel _________________ "Strive for tone." -John Coppola
Edwards X-13
ACB MV3C /ACB A1/26 backbore
https://yourbrass.com/ |
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yourbrass Heavyweight Member
Joined: 12 Jun 2011 Posts: 3632 Location: Pacifica, CA, USA
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Posted: Thu Jun 17, 2021 7:18 pm Post subject: |
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A business card sold on ebay, date unknown:
_________________ "Strive for tone." -John Coppola
Edwards X-13
ACB MV3C /ACB A1/26 backbore
https://yourbrass.com/ |
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