Schiller Alto

[LordeBedoo]

Is the Schiller “American Heritage” Alto trombone in Eb/Bb a good horn? I don’t need a professional alto and it’s within my price range, but I want to make sure it’s worth my time.

[BGuttman]

What are you planning to do with it?

If you just want it to say you have one, it's too expensive. (Free is too expensive in this case.)

If you are still learning tenor, you don't need an alto to make things more confusing. Comparing an alto trombone to a tenor is not like comparing an alto sax to a tenor sax. Comparing an alto trombone to a tenor trombone is like comparing an alto sax to a tenor sax where the key layout is different and it reads music in a different clef.

If you have a need for an alto because you are playing behind a chorus it's passable.

If you are an experienced player looking to learn alto it's OK.

If you want to play alto only like Michael Lake, it's OK.

[Finetales]

The short answer is no, it's not worth your time.

The long answer: There's nothing wrong with a (relatively) good Chinese alto to learn alto on and have fun with, but that Schiller is not one of the known good (again, relatively) Chinese altos. That honor (?) goes to the Jin Bao clone of the K&H Slokar alto trombone. Actually, Schiller does sell that as well, but unless you are dead set on buying a Schiller, there are better places to buy that same exact instrument from. Thomann, for example, sells it as the SL-35 for $140 less than the Schiller.

Currently, the best move would be to buy this used one on the Facebook Trombone Marketplace group, which comes with a no-longer-made aftermarket leadpipe that dramatically improves the instrument. You'd still be paying a lot less money than that Schiller with the valve costs, and you'd be guaranteed a decent instrument.

[MrHCinDE]

If you just want to have a go at alto, you might get more bang for your buck buying a used straight stencil alto, especially one where someone has already taken the trouble to swap the leadpipe. Keep an eye on the classifieds here.

The main use case for the Bb valve is to give access to lip trills at higher partials (i.e. on the Bb side of the horn) so although fun to practice it really is normally mainly a benefit for soloists, is that your intention? I have a Conn 36H with the Bb valve to give me the range as I sometimes cover french horn parts in a quintet and they can get surprisingly low.

The specs of that Schiller horn are interesting for another reason though, it has a relatively large dual bore .523”/.547” with a 7.16” bell. Most is the other budget altos are much smaller. It’d be interesting to try it side-by-side with one of the more common designs in the same price range.

[MrHCinDE]

Note: I saw the post from Finetales just after I posted, that’s exactly the stencil horn and after-market lead pipe I was talking about

[Crazy4Tbone86]

I agree with Finetales on this one. I bought this Schiller model several years ago (when the cost was about $400). I noticed immediately that there were some oddities with the instrument……….The two leadpipes that came with it were polar opposites (one was very short and very open, the other was super long and tight), the slide was poorly aligned and the clearance between inner an outer was only about.005 inch (normal clearance is .010 - .014), the wing-nut connector did not tighten to hold the slide firm, the B-flat attachment tubing was so long that it played in A with the tuning slide all the way in, the throw on the valve was ridiculously long and awkward. The list goes on and on…..

I have needed to do numerous things to make it more playable…….rebuilt the slide with Bach 36 and Bach 42 inners and outlers, rebuilt the trigger mechanism, changed the wing nut connection to one that actually works, etc…. I am actually planning to do one more thing to the horn in my spare time this summer and I hope that will make it feel comfortable enough to gig on it.

I am a tech and a tinkerer, so doing these things is a normal process with many of my horns. It has also increased the cost of this instrument considerably. I can’t see a normal, inquisitive player going through so much customization for in order to be happy with their horn. My recommendation is that money and practice time is better spent on a nicer model.