Tommy Johnson's Double Tubas
Over the years, Tommy Johnson would occasionally mention that
he would like to have built a modern version of his Carl Lehmann
double tuba from the 1930s (photos below). This was built in F
with change to BBb, but later modified for CC. I told him that
Larry Minick had worked on his own double tuba project for
years and I would occasionally talk to him about it. Larry tried a
number of configurations using a Conn 4/4 bell from the 1920s. It
was only a few years before he died that he told me that he had
finally come up with a design that he considered very playable and
he was happy with it. This was very similar in concept and a big
improvement on the famous York (also built here in Southern
California) that now resides in the Simonetti collection. Tommy
was already accustomed to the less extreme change system used
by Lehmann and had even used that instrument (modified by both
George Strucel and Dan Rauch) on gigs. Eventually, I agreed to
modify one of his Yamaha F tubas in a very similar manner, using
the existing 5th valve and I had to make the huge change valve
assembly myself. The 6th photo below shows how far I had to
tear down the original tuba. Not wanting to risk his favorite,
Tommy had me do this to the F tuba that he liked the least. The
results were a success. The CC side of the tuba was not as good
as a really good CC tuba, but the low notes were very good and
that was the whole point of this exercise. He decided that he
wanted to have the same thing done to his favorite F tuba since
that is the one that he would use in the studios. A year or so later,
I did the second one and it was even better the first. In both
cases, the playing characteristics of the F tuba were not
diminished.
Yamaha Corporation helped out with this project as a favor to
Tommy by supplying some of the crooks and tubing that I needed
to complete the project. After Tommy died in 2006, his widow
sold his tubas to fund a scholarship. The first double tuba went to
Justin Jerome and the second to Jim Self. Jim's take on these
instruments is here:
http://www.bassethoundmusic.com/doubleTuba.html.
he would like to have built a modern version of his Carl Lehmann
double tuba from the 1930s (photos below). This was built in F
with change to BBb, but later modified for CC. I told him that
Larry Minick had worked on his own double tuba project for
years and I would occasionally talk to him about it. Larry tried a
number of configurations using a Conn 4/4 bell from the 1920s. It
was only a few years before he died that he told me that he had
finally come up with a design that he considered very playable and
he was happy with it. This was very similar in concept and a big
improvement on the famous York (also built here in Southern
California) that now resides in the Simonetti collection. Tommy
was already accustomed to the less extreme change system used
by Lehmann and had even used that instrument (modified by both
George Strucel and Dan Rauch) on gigs. Eventually, I agreed to
modify one of his Yamaha F tubas in a very similar manner, using
the existing 5th valve and I had to make the huge change valve
assembly myself. The 6th photo below shows how far I had to
tear down the original tuba. Not wanting to risk his favorite,
Tommy had me do this to the F tuba that he liked the least. The
results were a success. The CC side of the tuba was not as good
as a really good CC tuba, but the low notes were very good and
that was the whole point of this exercise. He decided that he
wanted to have the same thing done to his favorite F tuba since
that is the one that he would use in the studios. A year or so later,
I did the second one and it was even better the first. In both
cases, the playing characteristics of the F tuba were not
diminished.
Yamaha Corporation helped out with this project as a favor to
Tommy by supplying some of the crooks and tubing that I needed
to complete the project. After Tommy died in 2006, his widow
sold his tubas to fund a scholarship. The first double tuba went to
Justin Jerome and the second to Jim Self. Jim's take on these
instruments is here:
http://www.bassethoundmusic.com/doubleTuba.html.
| Tommy playing the first double tuba for the first time. |
