Revisiting the World's Largest Tuba

I recently posted on what I'm pretty sure was "the largest tuba ever built," which was a giant Saxhorn bourdon built by Adolphe Sax and (apparently) featured at the Paris Exposition of 1867 (seen above a number of years later). 

To re-cap, here's the lithograph related to that Exposition, showing not only that enormous Saxhorn (on the right), but also a massive Saxtuba - a helicon-like version where the horn rests on the right shoulder, and the bell points forward:

After finding this image a number of years ago, I just wasn't convinced that these horns actually existed, as they are ridiculously large, and, well, I hadn't heard them mentioned anywhere, or seen either of them in a photograph - whether from that year, or years later. That is, until recently - check this out again, now a little closer up:

Here, in what is reportedly Sax's workshop in Rue de Dunkerque, Paris, stands that glorious monster seen on the right (side note: assuming that the man is about 5'6", the tuba stands about 10-11 feet tall). And that workshop, I'm told, was where Sax conducted business starting in the late 1870s, so my assumption, based on the lithograph, and then this photo, was that his giant Saxhorn bourdon was built for the Paris Exposition of 1867, and then kept in his workshop as a colossal conversation piece!

But now I'm not so sure. I'm thinking that this towering tuba might actually go all the way back to The Great Exhibition of 1851 in London. Follow along with me . . .

Bidding on the bourdon

First up is a newspaper report, from late 1877, revealing that Sax, after declaring bankruptcy for the third time in his life, sold at auction his collection of 467 musical instruments, which took him the previous 40 years to assemble. For our purposes, it states that

Perhaps the most amazing of the curiosities brought together by M. Saxe [sic], is the "Sax-horn bourdon." The length of this prodigious affair, when drawn out to its full length, is seventeen metres and a half . . . To give an idea of this enormous thing, it may be added that four men can easily stand together in its tube. And its roar, when sounded, fully justifies its name of "bourdon," which term designates the great deep-toned, booming "big bell" of cathedrals, &c.

That sure sounds like the exact same horn - especially the size of the bell, in which you could stuff four guys!

Related to that report is the catalogue that was created in 1877 to list and describe all of the instruments that were to be auctioned off. Sax scholar Eugenia Mitroulia, who examined that catalogue, shares that

The instrument with entry number 200 is a saxhorn bourdon. It was described as having a total length of seventeen metres, three valves, and diameter of the tubing towards the bell one metre. The particular instrument, which apparently has not survived, [has a] length of seventeen metres [which] would result in a pitch of 52-ft E-Flat.

Here we are provided with a few more details about this monster tuba - that it had three valves, and a bell diameter of about 39-40 inches (one meter), and that it is a 52-ft E-flat tuba. These all match the giant Saxhorn bourdon in the photo above.

And one more detail is revealed in that catalogue. Following the description of the horn, it says, "This instrument is made by Mr. Sax to prove that people of small height can very easily play on big instruments, and that it is not the metal that gives the sound and the timbre" (translated from the French by Mitroulia).

Reports on the auction reveal that Sax's instrument collection was divided up between three buyers (the museums of the Conservatoires of Paris and Brussels, and the private museum of M. Sweck, of Renaix, Belgium) for "the sum of 12,060 francs, barely a quarter of its value." Further, "the famous saxhorn-bourdon, 17 meters in length, [sold for] 410 francs," but we are not told who purchased it - nor do we know what happened to it. This historic horn has apparently not been seen since that time (odd, if it was indeed purchased by a museum).

Lurking in the shadows

The first clue that was brought to my attention that clarified that this massive Saxhorn had been built prior to 1867 is the following lithograph, seen in the July 10, 1864 edition of L'Illustration, Journal Universel:

The caption at the bottom reads, "Audition of new instruments by Sax (Sax Hall, Rue Saint-Georges)," but lurking in the shadows in the back left of the image is our monster, leaning up against the wall. Here's a closer look:

While the instrument appears taller than 10 feet, it may be propped up on something, or the lithographer perhaps exaggerated its height. But it definitely appears to be the giant Saxhorn bourdon, just sitting there in Sax's workshop in Rue de Saint-Georges, which is where he had conducted business since 1843. In fact, here's a lithograph of the exterior of that workshop:

Behold the back row bourdons!

Two years earlier, in 1862, we get the earliest known glimpse of the giant Saxhorn bourdon, along with its slightly shorter and more slender siblings, in this lithograph showing the display case that Sax featured at the International Exhibition in London (found in the January 3, 1863 edition of Le Monde Illustre):

This case appears identical to the one in Sax Hall in the 1864 lithograph above (minus the fancy top decor - perhaps because it didn't' fit?), as well as the 1867 lithograph (a dead-ringer in that case), suggesting that Sax simply took the whole thing home to Paris after the Exhibition of 1862. But in London, the giant Saxhorn bourdon was featured in the case itself, as we can see here.

But there are indeed a few other oversized Saxhorns to its left (our right), as well as a few Saxtubas hanging from the upper part of the case. I've colored them in to help identify everything:

 

The two Saxtubas are in blue (and you'll remember that there was apparently an even larger Saxtuba featured in the Paris Exposition of 1867, as seen toward the top of this post); the giant Saxhorn bourdon is in green; then there are two very tall Saxhorns (perhaps contrabass?) next to the giant - one that is just slightly shorter, shown in orange, and one that is two or three feet shorter, shown in yellow. We'll see those two again, I'm pretty sure, in a photograph from 1851 below. And then the two saxhorns in pink may be contrabass instruments, and perhaps one of them is the 26-ft E-flat from 1855, mentioned below.

But here we have clear proof (assuming the lithograph reflects reality!) that the giant Saxhorn bourdon existed at least as early as 1862. What about earlier than that?

See you in the funny papers!

Seven years earlier, for the Paris Exposition of 1855, Sax built and exhibited a 26-ft E-flat contrabass Saxhorn bourdon which survives to this day in the Henri Selmer collection in Paris:

Based on this photograph (which, I'm told, shows Joseph Brousse [1864-1937], tuba player for the Paris Opera, standing next to it), this horn is significantly smaller than the giant Saxhorn bourdon above. This one appears to be about 6 feet tall, and the bell diameter is said to be 22 inches so about half the size of the giant's bell (but, hey, it's still an enormous tuba!).

What's significant is that a number of cartoons that are connected with that 1855 Exposition poke fun at Sax's giant tuba, and I'm just wondering, based on the size shown in these illustrations, if the artist is perhaps referring to the larger horn (what I've been calling the giant Saxhorn bourdon), which may have made an appearance at that Exposition as well. Check these out, all of which appear in editions of Le Charivari in late 1855 - this one dated October 21:

The caption reads, "The musician for whom Mr. Sax made his new trumpet [tuba]." But notice what appears to be a second, smaller over-sized tuba bell on the left. Does this account for both the 26-ft E-flat and the 52-ft E-flat Saxhorn bourdons? The next cartoon is from October 28:

The caption here reads, "What will inevitably happen the day Mr. Sax blows a little too hard in his new trumpet [tuba]." It clearly imagines a massive horn! Then, there are two cartoons in the November 4 edition:

The caption for this one reads, "The audience visiting Mr. Sax's trumpet [tuba]," which, again, imagines a horn like the larger Saxhorn bourdon. And then the second cartoon in this edition has a little fun with Rossini:

The caption reads, "Rossini at the Exposition. The illustrious Rossini taking Mr. Sax's trumpet [tuba] for a steam engine." (And notice again that there appear to be smaller, but still large, saxhorns in the background - one on either side of the massive one dogging Rossini!

Again, all of these cartoons seem to be imagining the larger, 52-ft E-flat, Saxhorn bourdon, but can we find any evidence of this massive horn before 1855?

What does the Crystal Palace reveal?

For the Great Exhibition of 1851, held in the stunning Crystal Palace in Hyde Park, London, Sax featured 85 of his instruments in this beautiful display case:

In the back of the case, in the center and on the left, are two rather tall instruments that are probably stretched-out versions of contrabass (or subcontrabass?) Saxhorns - perhaps the very horns next to the giant Saxhorn bourdon in the lithograph from 1862 above (and maybe even the two seen in the background of the last of the cartoons above). 

Based on the length of the clarinet in the center of the case, which would have been about 2 feet, the case appears to be about 9 feet tall, suggesting that the contrabass Saxhorn on the left was close to that height (we can't see the top of it), and the one in the middle a foot or two shorter than the first one.

But the earliest reference I have found to a giant Saxhorn at that Exhibition is from the July 5, 1851 edition of Washington D. C.'s Weekly National Intelligencer, which says, "Sax has provided eighty-five instruments, (wind,) most of them invented or perfected by himself. The most remarkable in size is a Sax-horn bourdon, three yards high, and of not less than forty-eight feet of tube."

Is that referring to the slender Saxhorn in the back of the case on the left? Or is it referring to an even larger horn that is not in the photo? The dimensions given, "three yards high, and of not less than forty-eight feet of tube," are pretty close to the 52-ft E-flat Saxhorn bourdon that stands an impressive 10-11 feet tall - the very horn under consideration in this post.

About a month after that initial report, a more delightfully descriptive one came out in the August 10, 1851 edition of Le Pionnier de l'Assomption, out of Napoleonville, Louisiana (translated from the French by Google):

The Sax-horn bourdon, three meters high, forty-eight feet of tube development, monster instrument, the last of the family invented by the famous Belgian, a real trumpet of Jericho, which one would think  destined to the breath of some gigantic Boreas [the Greek god of the north wind], and which resounds in a formidable way, by the mere displacement of the air under the vibration of the lips.

"This one is the giant bass"

A decade later, in 1861, the great French musicologist Pontecoulant referred back to a spectacular horn featured by Sax at the Great Exhibition of 1851, describing it as (again, with translation help from Google)

the sax-horn-bourdon, descending to the extra B flat [which is about as low as a subcontrabass Eb instrument can go], whose development is 48 feet in length [probably 52], and whose height is 3 meters. This one is the giant bass. At its appearance, one would think that no human lung could be sufficient for the insufflation necessary for this gigantic instrument; yet its proportions are so well regulated, its contours so soft, the play of its pistons is so easy, that it could easily be played before the jury of the exhibition by a person who had never touched it.

In considering the size, height, and the description, declaring that "this one is the giant bass," and referring to this "gigantic instrument," it seems likely that Pontecoulant has in mind the massive Saxhorn bourdon under consideration here.

But, alas, I have not yet found any photo of this giant tuba at the Exhibition of 1851, so we can't say for sure. However, it's hard to be confident in a different conclusion in light of all of the evidence above. But feel free to prove me wrong!

What we can say for sure at this point, based on my research of giant tubas over the past few years, is that this horn stands as "the world's largest tuba." At least nine other subcontrabass tubas have appeared since the creation of this one, but none are anywhere close to its size.

[Special thanks to Doug Yeo and Eugenia Mitroulia for corresponding with me about this amazing instrument!]