Mirafone fantasy

[Mary Ann]

I'd like the opportunity to play one and compare it to my 494. Pretty sure I can't heft it at this point in my ongoing physical demise, but still curious.

The 494 I played is a great tuba. It would be an interesting comparison.

Rick “thinking the 494 is a bit smaller, but bigger than a 184” Denney

Having had both -- the 494 is WAY bigger than a 184 (assuming CC; maybe you meant BBb 184.) Bigger in terms of air, bigger in terms of sound. Way so. Bigger in terms of air than a 186 CC too. And for me, I am enamoured of the sound of the 494 in a way that no CC has ever attracted me.

[Rick Denney]

Having had both -- the 494 is WAY bigger than a 184 (assuming CC; maybe you meant BBb 184.) Bigger in terms of air, bigger in terms of sound. Way so. Bigger in terms of air than a 186 CC too. And for me, I am enamoured of the sound of the 494 in a way that no CC has ever attracted me.

MA, I thought you were talking about a 186, not a 184. The 494 is supposed to be a 3/4 tuba, I think, but that's at least a little bit grade inflation. I've never played a 185--maybe that's the correct comparison. But the 494 is contrabass through and through, and my 184 is what I have called an F tuba with Bb fingerings (which is sometimes just what I need).

I didn't compare it directly with the 186 I just bought side by side, but my air-o-meter is calibrated for the Hirsbrunner, which is a lot bigger than any of the above, and the 494 didn't jump out at me as being an air hog, or even noticeably different in that regard than a 186.

The 494 and the 186 I bought were all of about four feet from each other at the workshop, but for me the 494 (at about 8 times the price) was more about curiosity than serious intent, else I might have gone back and forth between them rather than playing them four hours apart.

Rick "hard to remember five minutes of tooting four hours later, after having played ten other tubas in between" Denney

[Mary Ann]

@Rick Denney
For a normally-sized tuba player, the 494 wouldn't be an air hog. For someone my size, it needs more than I have for sustained low notes. I love it anyway. I do really well with the NStar for air, but again when I get very far below the staff, sustaining notes requires an expertise in circular breathing that I don't have.

[bloke]

It seems to me that - over the years, and particularly in more recent decades) that manufacturer has used their 19.6mm bore tubing and valves (the bore size of which has been used on the model 86 forever) on more and more new models.

What is the bore size of the 494 ?

[Rick Denney]

It seems to me that - over the years, and particularly in more recent decades) that manufacturer has used their 19.6mm bore tubing and valves (the bore size of which has been used on the model 86 forever) on more and more new models.

What is the bore size of the 494 ?

18.8mm, 0.740". 36" tall with a 17" bell.

Rick "fun to play" Denney

[bloke]

Reimagined 185, I suppose...though (at least, re: a couple of 185 BB-flats that I've played) the 185 BB-flat tubas offered comically quirky tuning characteristics.

All of the recently-developed Miraphone models I've played (POST 1291-2-3 C models...ie. excluding those) have offered forth pretty easy-to-deal-with tuning characteristics.

The crazy-looking Miraphone BB-flat that I currently own:
Its appearance is so bizarre (though - I guess - it can grow on people) that it LOOKS like something that could not POSSIBLY be played in tune, yet it can.

bloke "I probably - just now - triggered a few folks. "

[Mary Ann]

The 494 has excellent intonation.

[Rick Denney]

First gig—the quintet played for the opening ceremony of a conference.

IMG_1940-dsqz.jpeg (64.43 KiB) Viewed 8982 times

IMG_1942-dsqz.jpeg (66.27 KiB) Viewed 8982 times

It presents pretty well, from a distance. And it’s just right for quintet lit except for tuba-as-2nd-trombone, when a F is better.

Rick “and this was before removing the splotchy lacquer” Denney

[prodigal]

That is a fine-looking tuba!

[prodigal]

Great thread people! I might huff and puff on the "Trashcan" tomorrow. (My school's 2004 186BBb which has been roughly treated by young scholars, but recently refurbished.)

PS: I'm researching BBbs for a possible purchase for my son when the time is right. He's making good progress on the baritone, and I borrowed a little 3/4ish BBb Jupiter to get him going on tuba.

(He ain't getting my 186CC or the PT-15 anytime in the next decade! Dad's pulling rank, there.)

[Mark]

Here you go:

Miraphone.jpg (98.18 KiB) Viewed 8905 times

I bought this new, with a gig bag, from Bill Rose. I think this was the year after I was in the Texas All-State Band with Rose's son, also a tuba player. I sold it a few years later.

The serial number is on the receipt. If any one has this horn, I'd like to know about it.

[bloke]

I listen to some old recordings playing a184 C (only four valves, but added one later) that I bought new and (as I bought two of those, and I'm confused about which one went where) either ended up as property of a high school or property of Ron Bishop... I think that one actually ended up being property of a high school...
... but playing them these days and noticing all their tuning quirks - and then listening to some recordings I made a half century ago where I played the thing pretty darn well in tune with a piano - I was really working hard !!!!

I'm thinking that Miraphone is much more comfortable building B flat instruments... particularly in the modern era... and I view them as (in this) being the leader in a trend, rather than dwelling in the past, in regards to this.

[York-aholic]

Here you go:

Miraphone.jpg

I bought this new, with a gig bag, from Bill Rose. I think this was the year after I was in the Texas All-State Band with Rose's son, also a tuba player. I sold it a few years later.

The serial number is on the receipt. If any one has this horn, I'd like to know about it.

Thank you for posting that. I own 765x, a BBb 4u, soon eventually to be a 5u.

[Rick Denney]

Here you go:

Miraphone.jpg

I bought this new, with a gig bag, from Bill Rose. I think this was the year after I was in the Texas All-State Band with Rose's son, also a tuba player. I sold it a few years later.

The serial number is on the receipt. If any one has this horn, I'd like to know about it.

It’s a realistic fantasy. That’s two on this forum who lived it for real. What high school did you attend?

The serial number of mine is 5933, which resolves to 1970. They serialized about 800 tubas in 1970, 1000 in 1971, and 600 in 1972. Yours was high in the range for ‘72, but the receipt shows it was late in the year. I think yours hadn’t sat around more than a month or two after arriving from Germany.

Yup, a thousand bucks. Real money in those days—my father paid only 15 times that for the house I grew up in. 15 times a current Miraphone price would probably buy the same house now if it was relocated to the current Houston fringe exurbs, except that nobody builds houses like that any more.

Finding that original receipt for mine would be awesome, but I don’t have any of the receipts for the tubas I’ve bought and I amazed you still have yours. Thanks for posting it.

Rick “grew up next to the rice fields that are now the Galleria” Denney

[bloke]

The '70s were an incredibly inflationary period.

In the early seventies, there was one department store (only a couple of blocks from my parents' home) that had a gas station (which was sort of a radically new thing at that time for department stores) that sold 91 octane regular gas for 20 cents a gallon.

Towards the end of the '70s, the cheapest gas available was 50 cents a gallon.

Even by 1976, Wichita Band Instrument Company had a blowout sale to attract attention to themselves as being Miraphone sellers, and the lowest prices they were offering for the four valve 186 C was about $1, 600. I pulled about $1,450 out of my personal gig earnings, and bought a 184 C (only four valves) from them.

Giardinelli in New York was bringing in some B&S tubas at that time - including F instruments - for sub $1,000 prices. I was ignorant and didn't know anything about those.

[Charlie C Chowder]

I too had the Mirafone fantasy as about the same time. Astoria HS bought one the year after I graduated in '69. 30 years later, when I could start buying my own toys, I first got an Amati copy. Then a Mirafone. Now I have a Marzan and the other two are gone. I only have so much room, and the Marzan is my favorite even though it was the ugliest. The recent beautification work I had Rosecity Music do has made it presentable to play in public.

CCC

[tofu]

My very first exposure to Mirafone was in early spring 1974 as a HS sophomore when my Chicago area HS band spent Spring Break doing a series of concerts in Southern California. San Diego, Whittier, Costa Mesa, Whittier, Long Beach, Santa Monica, San Diego, LA and a couple other places I can’t remember. 2 concerts per day and to full halls - we were unusually good, but I still have no idea how we pulled such crowds. The only down time was 2 hours at Disneyland one day. We stayed in the homes of families of the local High Schools along the way. I can’t remember what town it was (maybe Whittier), but I stayed with one family in a very nice house - but what I remember most was initially walking into the house and being blinded by the sight of something on the order of 40 new Mirafones standing on their bells spread throughout the living room and dining room with clear plastic bags over each of them. I had never even heard of Mirafone prior to that.

Like a lot of other people on here my folks couldn’t have afforded to spend a grand for a tuba or even a used tuba of any kind. Buying a tuba wasn’t something I had even considered - especially with school providing a horn for free. I was enthralled walking into a house full of shiny new tuba’s - with Kranz's no less - with the rage at the time - rotary valves! I had no idea what they cost then and as a broke HS kid I just assumed they cost a fortune and being German - they just had to be good. Did not get to meet the dad the 2 days I stayed in that home - I do remember the mom saying he had something to do Mirafone -this kid wasn’t going to let a house full of tubas go unmentioned (I now assume he was with the CA distributor). He was away on a business trip to Germany at the time. I so wanted to sneak one of those horns out & back on the plane. After that trip I had Mirafone lust - even though the next year my HS handed me a new Rudy Meinl - which because it didn’t have a Krantz I assumed had to be inferior to a Mirafone.

I don’t recall ever seeing any Mirafones / Miraphones here in the Chicago/Midwest area back in the seventies. Most schools had Conns,Kings, Holtons with a lot Bessons as well. Really no German tubas to speak of. We got the Rudy’s in the 70’s because the Orchestra Director was a tuba player and the jazz band director was a pro jazz tuba player. Prior to that it was all Conn 20j’s and 25j’s with Conn 36k’s for marching. They ended up getting 40 good years out of those Rudy’s - which lasted until a new idiot band director (clarinet player) got hired & replaced them with Yamaha’s 10 years ago or so.

[prodigal]

But Yamahas are the best!

I just oiled up my 186CC, I can't believe how light it is even vs. my PT-15. I love Mirafone contrabasses.

[Rick Denney]

I tried to identify anyone at Mirafone USA that would have been located in Whittier during the Sun Valley years, but could not. Mirafone USA was founded by Howard Lockie, who was the owner of Lockie's Music in Los Angeles. He had partnered at some point with Roy J. Maier, who was a saxophonist and reed-maker who had taken over or merged (or something) with Rico Reeds. During WWII, he even started growing his own cane in California because French supplies were interrupted. Eventually, he had a building in the Sun Valley neighborhood of the San Fernando Valley, and the vestiges of the old sign on the building still makes "Maier Corporation" possible to pick out. That became the location for Mirafone USA, which was the first and main importer of Miraphone tubas from about 1960 until what was left of the company relocated to San Antonio in the 80's. Who would have had 40 brand new Miraphones in their living room? Dunno. But it's clear from the receipt from Bill Rose above that various professional musicians around the country were given resale rights to Miraphone tubas as (probably) a side hustle. I'm thinking of Winston Morris as perhaps chief among them, in addition to Roger Bobo and Tommy Johnson. Maybe one of those scored a big purchase from a university program or local school district or something.

So, that led me down a fun rabbit hole, but it didn't go quite deep enough.

Rick "so much for today's lunch break" Denney

[Mikelynch]

Mark--Interesting to know you bought your Mirafone from Bill also.

I bought my 186 BBb in 1966 (with some assistance). Then, the tuba was $650.00, and the hard case was $90. At that time, I had never seen a tuba bag. That instrument had the classic Mirafone lacquer that would deteriorate if one looked hard at the horn.

Now that I am playing a lot more BBb than I did for many years, that horn is currently being restored.

I also own a '63 186 CC originally purchased from Bill by Fred Angerstine.

Mike