"Brand" brand plastic mouthpieces?

[ghmerrill]

Yeah, there may be some kind of subtle Swiss humor going on here -- using "Brand" as a brand name.

Anyhow ... I stumbled across these quite by accident. I'm thinking of starting to play my little 1947 Olds Standard on a regular basis and am just casually looking around for possible mouthpiece alternatives (and yes, I have read the threads on this stuff here , and don't want to rehash them). What I settled on after I got the horn and experimented with it a bit was a Kelly 12C -- for a few reasons: It feels comfortable to me, seems like a decent size for me, I like the sound I can get out of it on the horn, and (drum roll ...) I could contour the shank so that it actually fits in the lead pipe correctly (!). So I'm not wringing my hands about mouthpiece selection, or changing at this point, but I am curious about these in particular.

Has anyone tried them? Anybody use one regularly? They're pretty pricey for plastic (Thomann), but -- you know -- advanced technology and all that. About twice as much as Kelly. But definitely more selections, and the appearance is more ... comment dit-on? ... Avant-garde?

[EriKon]

I have one that came with my Edwards btb when I bought it used. The design is pretty similar to Denis Wick mouthpieces to me, especially the rim design. Not a bad mouthpiece by no means, but I don't like the feeling of full plastic mouthpieces in general. Haven't used this one for a long time but I used it as a steady mouthpiece for a while about 10 years ago and from what I remember it played surprisingly well, but the sound was different compared to a 'real' mouthpiece. Just a little... plastic. Not the most helpful comment, I guess, but I can't describe it better

[ghmerrill]

That's actually quite helpful/informative to me. And they did look Wickish to me. I like Wick (trombone) mouthpieces and currently have two -- though I don't use them. But I might use them if I had a larger bore tenor. For bass, I've never cared for them and found them to be a bit "bright."

I also really like plastic rims. And I don't mind a plastic mouthpiece, though I feel that you're right about the difference in timbre. For a tuba, this can actually be good (the last couple of times I saw Charles Daellenbach play, he was using a Kelly, and I use one on my 1924 tuba), but for a trombone I think it may limit what you can do (or at least make it more work).

[AtomicClock]

The Thomann site includes (metal?) tone boosters for the Brands. Maybe that makes them feel less plastickey.

[ghmerrill]

The Thomann site includes (metal?) tone boosters for the Brands. Maybe that makes them feel less plastickey.

Sounds like a triumph of their marketing staff. "Sell them x, and them sell them y to make x better."

I'm not a fan of tone boosters and view them as a return to the days of alchemy and voodoo. The euph people went nuts about them for several years, but seem to have drifted away from the attraction at this point.

Also, I'd want some initial confidence that I was doing what I could to boost the tone by myself -- that seeming to be a big part of playing the instrument.

[Finetales]

Yeah, there may be some kind of subtle Swiss humor going on here -- using "Brand" as a brand name.

Sadly it's not subtle humor, it's just a last name (Michael Brand).

Has anyone tried them? Anybody use one regularly?

Yes, I've tried a bunch of them at NAMM and used one as my main commercial trumpet mouthpiece for quite a few years. The trumpet mouthpieces are pretty good, but overall I can't recommend the Brand. (See what I did there?)

The Thomann site includes (metal?) tone boosters for the Brands. Maybe that makes them feel less plastickey.

Sounds like a triumph of their marketing staff. "Sell them x, and them sell them y to make x better."

In the case of the Brand mouthpieces, the metal booster makes a night and day difference.

In my experience they are pretty much unplayable without the booster, but with it they are decent to excellent depending on the model. The booster is quite heavy, and adding that much weight to a plastic mouthpiece that weighs pretty much nothing has a very noticeable effect. I do wish they made the mouthpieces and booster so the booster could just screw on and off...the suction system they went with is terrible.

I've spent time on Brand's entire range, and to be honest I didn't love any of the trombone mouthpieces. They were comfortable and played fine, but from behind the bell (and in front of the bell, according to those who listened) the sound was dead, even with the booster. (I do not have the same experience with Kelly mouthpieces, for what it's worth...I have a couple and they sound just as full as my brass mouthpieces.)

The trumpet mouthpieces were much better, so much that I ended up buying one at NAMM in 2019. But I was not a fan of the trombone mouthpieces. The sales guys there were also VERY pushy...I bought the trumpet piece because it was a big improvement over what I had at the time, but they were practically begging me to buy a trombone mouthpiece too. At last year's NAMM one of them was being a real creep to me, so I'll be giving the Brand/DaCarbo booth a wide berth from now on.

[ghmerrill]

Sadly it's not subtle humor, it's just a last name (Michael Brand).

Or an even more subtle triple pun.

... but overall I can't recommend the Brand. (See what I did there?)

Precisely.

(I do not have the same experience with Kelly mouthpieces, for what it's worth...I have a couple and they sound just as full as my brass mouthpieces.)

Interesting. At this point, and given relative costs, it doesn't sound as though this is a direction I'd want to explore merely in the interests of experimentation.

[EriKon]

Glad to hear someone else feels similar about those.

[BrassSection]

Used a nylon mouthpiece back in school days, great for marching band in subfreezing weather. Beyond that, I preferred good old metal. I think I still have it stashed in a drawer someplace, probably very brittle by now.

[ghmerrill]

I remember those -- though never used one since I was playing saxophone then. The Lexan stuff is different/better. And the metal bowl/shank with Lexan rim is way better.

[EriKon]

I remember those -- though never used one since I was playing saxophone then. The Lexan stuff is different/better. And the metal bowl/shank with Lexan rim is way better.

Is Brand using Lexan as well?

[ghmerrill]

They say that they are "special plastic". Apparently not Lexan:

https://4barsrest.com/reviews/products/inst074.asp

[SFA]

Aubrey Logan uses a mouthpiece that is branded with the Brand brand.

[ghmerrill]

Aubrey Logan uses a mouthpiece that is branded with the Brand brand.

There's a comedy routine lurking here akin to the old Abbott and Costello "Who's on first?"

[Posaunus]

They say that they are "special plastic". Apparently not Lexan:

https://4barsrest.com/reviews/products/inst074.asp

Brand claims that the mouthpieces are made from "a cellulose based compound which was biologically inert, BPA free and Phthalate free." [Several plastics meet these criteria.] I doubt that this is in any way a proprietary material - it's simply an off-the-shelf product that can be purchased in small volume at a reasonable price for his mouthpieces (which appear to be injection-molded) - probably cellulose acetate that uses Triacetine as a plasticizer instead of the more common Diethyl phthalate. But it's always good to market a little magic and mystery.

[ghmerrill]

My impression from skimming the mundstuecke.ch site is that the real innovation being sold is not in the materials, but in the so-called "TurboBore" (or their rebranding of this as "Turboblow") -- which is the spiral path created in the mouthpiece bore for the "air" (Luft) to follow. I then surmise/speculate that they may have moved in the direction of injection molded plastic pieces because the fabrication of metal mouthpieces of this design must be quite expensive.

In turn, I then wonder if -- because of this materials difference -- the metal version performs significantly differently from the plastic one. But also color me skeptical about some of the "reasoning" behind this design: "Wenn man eine Flasche gefüllt mit einer Flüssigkeit ausschütten will, funktioniert dies auch besser, wenn die Flasche zusätzlich gedreht wird." I'm not sure what effect that's supposed to have on, say, acoustics.

Brand appears to have acquired a long-term license for the patent for this design from the estate of Romeo Adaci -- the inventor, and a trumpet player and instrument maker and repairman of some repute.