Selmer Bolero Trombone - Your Thoughts

[Posaunus]

I'm interested in your perspective on Selmer Bolero trombones. I have not played one, but I understand that they are 0.508" bore, with 8" yellow brass bell, so sort of similar to a King 3B. Mostly made in 1960s-1970s in Paris, I believe.

Are these considered good jazz trombones? Good big band lead trombones? Do they blend well with "typical"
American trombones (Conn, King, Bach, Shires, Getzen, ...) ?

What would be the value ($) of one in good condition?

Thanks for your advice!

[MStarke]

I owned one for one or two years a few years ago. IIRC it had a lightweight slide, easy response and nice sound. I remember that it at least "felt" relatively bright. I couldn't compare to much else back than and didn't play it with others due to COVID etc.

Replaced it with a Conn 6h which to my ears had a somewhat darker and a little more compact sound and felt more solid. To me it was a better match overall. But the Bolero is a good instrument! And often not too expensive.

[RJMason]

I owned one for a few years. I really enjoyed playing it. Mine didn’t really get edgy. The low mid range was really quite fat. High range a little thin. Looked like a 3B sounded nothing like it.

It was the only time a fellow trombonist asked me to back off on a trombone 2 part because it had so much juice. After that I just used it if I was the only (tenor) trombone. I think I found it to be a little “old school” in sound profile.

I think the 6H is a better horn for this type of old school sound yet blends better in contemporary settings. But if you can get one for cheap I’m sure you’d enjoy it! The Largo (large bore) on the other hand, was never really my thing.

[salsabone]

If you come across a good example of this horn ...Bolero, you will regret passing on it FOREVER!!!!!

[hyperbolica]

I had a Bolero for a while, I think with an F attachment. People compare it to the 3b, but I think the Bolero is much heavier than the 3b. To me it gives vibes of an Olds horn. Like an Olds Recording, but the Recording is a better instrument. Still a bit quirky maybe.

You already have a Getzen 3508 and an Olds Recording, right? Both much better, with the 3508 the best for "modern" sensibilities.

If you've never played a Bach NY 6, you're kind of missing out. You keep hearing the phrase "plays bigger than the bore indicates". The sentiment is true, but the basic truth is that people back in the 30s and 40s weren't surprised by these horns, we are just desensitized with inefficient 547 bores. The Bach 6 is a killer horn with a big fat sound and a crazy high range. And you can get a fantastic NY built Bach for $1000-1300. Just something to add to the mix.

[pbone3b]

I have one on consignment @ Josh Landress Brass in NYC
https://www.jlandressbrass.com/shop/Tro ... 268084.htm
I liked it, especially the ergonomics with its slightly wider slide, but ultimately, I have too many .508s

[slidefunk]

I tried one at the Brass Exchange a couple of years ago that played pretty well. I thought it was good value for the price.

[Cotboneman]

When I was an undergraduate student at DePaul University in Chicago in the mid 70's, my trombone teacher was Mark McDunn, who was a Selmer clinician and played a Bolero. On a trip to Paris in 1976 he brought back several Boleros off the line and I bought one. I think I paid $680 for the horn, which in 1976 was a princely sum for a starving college student!
Mark had a very bright, commercial sound, and the horn could really speak, which is what he liked. It could bark and I enjoyed playing it, but over time it really suffered from big lacquer wear at contact points, and I had started playing more legit stuff, for which I needed an F trigger and bigger horn, so I turned to a 42B as my principal horn.
I got married in grad school and newlywed poverty forced me to sell the Bolero to one of my students in the 80's. I wish in hindsight that I had kept it. It was a really fine playing trombone.

[jonathanharker]

I got a second-hand Selmer Paris Bolero for my 12th birthday. It served me well in school all the way to Grade 8 and LTCL, but I don't play it much after I moved to large tenor and bass at university. It's currently in the shop having its own birthday service, many years later...! Someone said it's like an Olds Recording - I'd agree with that; lovely sound, plays well.

[Sesquitone]

When I was an undergraduate student at DePaul University in Chicago in the mid 70's, my trombone teacher was Mark McDunn, who was a Selmer clinician and played a Bolero. On a trip to Paris in 1976 he brought back several Boleros off the line and I bought one. I think I paid $680 for the horn, which in 1976 was a princely sum for a starving college student!
Mark had a very bright, commercial sound, and the horn could really speak, which is what he liked. It could bark and I enjoyed playing it, but over time it really suffered from big lacquer wear at contact points, and I had started playing more legit stuff, for which I needed an F trigger and bigger horn, so I turned to a 42B as my principal horn.
I got married in grad school and newlywed poverty forced me to sell the Bolero to one of my students in the 80's. I wish in hindsight that I had kept it. It was a really fine playing trombone.

It's ironic that you should mention Mark McDunn and the Bolero (and the price) in the same paragraph. In 1960, I had recently figured out that a minor-third tuning was far (far!) better than a P4 tuning for providing many handy attachment alternates—completely unaware (until decades later) that Mark had developed the Bb/G tuning for young students with short arms just a couple of years prior to that.

Lloyd Fillio (then newly at Selmer) was kind enough to chop down the F attachment on a Selmer (Paris) "Bolero" to that tuning. I paid $570 for the customised instrument and case—including the extra $40 for the customising! [Also exorbitant for a poor (engineering) graduate student.] I found it to be generally "sweet" toned, but with plenty of power as principal of the Cornell Symphony Orchestra, and, yes, it could be "barky" enough for growling away in a little Dixieland band.

Unfortunately, this was stolen in 1981 from our home in Staten Island—along with my Bb/G+E=D customised Conn 88H, a Meinl and Lauber bass sackbut (and several other "odd" early-music instruments). Given the "unusual" nature of all of these, I wouldn't be surprised if the trombones and sackbut ended up nailed to a wall behind the bar of some sleazy dive in Greenwich Village. [I replaced it with an Olds Recording model, which (contrary a previous comment) was nothing like the Bolero, although a great instrument in many other ways—most importantly: its dual-bore slide matched that of the (now G) attachment, so the usual "oversized-attachment" intonation problems were totally absent.]



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[Posaunus]

I got a second-hand Selmer Paris Bolero for my 12th birthday. ... It's currently in the shop having its own birthday service, many years later...! Someone said it's like an Olds Recording - I'd agree with that; lovely sound, plays well.

I was trying to learn about the Selmer Bolero on behalf of a friend who was looking for a jazz / big band lead trombone. I was recently able to try out a Bolero - found it O.K., but nothing special. It seemed(to me) not at all like an Olds R-15 Recording. My latest fling is a very nice late 1970s King 3B, which I think much better suits the purpose!

[jonathanharker]

Growing up in Palmerston North I got to play an Olds Recording a few times that belonged to Happy O'Hara. Maybe I got a particularly nice Bolero?

[Cotboneman]

When I was an undergraduate student at DePaul University in Chicago in the mid 70's, my trombone teacher was Mark McDunn, who was a Selmer clinician and played a Bolero. On a trip to Paris in 1976 he brought back several Boleros off the line and I bought one. I think I paid $680 for the horn, which in 1976 was a princely sum for a starving college student!
Mark had a very bright, commercial sound, and the horn could really speak, which is what he liked. It could bark and I enjoyed playing it, but over time it really suffered from big lacquer wear at contact points, and I had started playing more legit stuff, for which I needed an F trigger and bigger horn, so I turned to a 42B as my principal horn.
I got married in grad school and newlywed poverty forced me to sell the Bolero to one of my students in the 80's. I wish in hindsight that I had kept it. It was a really fine playing trombone.

It's ironic that you should mention Mark McDunn and the Bolero (and the price) in the same paragraph. In 1960, I had recently figured out that a minor-third tuning was far (far!) better than a P4 tuning for providing many handy attachment alternates—completely unaware (until decades later) that Mark had developed the Bb/G tuning for young students with short arms just a couple of years prior to that.

Lloyd Fillio (then newly at Selmer) was kind enough to chop down the F attachment on a Selmer (Paris) "Bolero" to that tuning. I paid $570 for the customised instrument and case—including the extra $40 for the customising! [Also exorbitant for a poor (engineering) graduate student.] I found it to be generally "sweet" toned, but with plenty of power as principal of the Cornell Symphony Orchestra, and, yes, it could be "barky" enough for growling away in a little Dixieland band.

Unfortunately, this was stolen in 1981 from our home in Staten Island—along with my Bb/G+E=D customised Conn 88H, a Meinl and Lauber bass sackbut (and several other "odd" early-music instruments). Given the "unusual" nature of all of these, I wouldn't be surprised if the trombones and sackbut ended up nailed to a wall behind the bar of some sleazy dive in Greenwich Village. [I replaced it with an Olds Recording model, which (contrary a previous comment) was nothing like the Bolero, although a great instrument in many other ways—most importantly: its dual-bore slide matched that of the (now G) attachment, so the usual "oversized-attachment" intonation problems were totally absent.]

I do recall him mentioning the special tuning he had developed for young players a time or two, but I never saw one in action. Sorry to hear about the theft; sadly you are probably right about where they ended up!

.

[Sesquitone]

Mark had developed the Bb/G tuning for young students with short arms.

I do recall him mentioning the special tuning he had developed for young players a time or two, but I never saw one in action.

As I understand it, Mark worked closely with Holton to produce the TR-650 Collegiate model, tuned Bb/G, with a full-length slide (i.e. 7 positions in Bb, 6 in G). He wrote an article for the Musical Journal about the idea of "A Slide Trombone for Short Arms", published in March, 1966. In the accompanying (unfortunately overly dark) picture (where you can just make out the respective bells and the two slide bows), Mark is shown playing a note in slide-alone 7th position, while the young Philip Azzolina is playing the same note in G-attachment 4th position (which lies between slide-alone 4th and 5th). [Clearly, the instrument could have been built with a shorter (and thereby a better balanced) slide.]

I wonder if Philip kept up his interest in the trombone as he grew up—and whether he retained the minor-third attachment.

[I apologise for drifting away from the beautiful Bolero. I can (perhaps) justify this, because my Bolero, customised in 1960, also had a minor-third attachment and a full-length slide—just like the Holton TR-650 (which I was totally unaware of at the time).]

Just in case anyone is wondering exactly where the relative slide positions are, I've added in the ETSP Chart for the Bb/G tenor, with a full-length slide (McDunn's Holton or my Bolero): note the alternate positions for E2 and B2. [The dashed lines show major-second increments between adjacent harmonics—a good diagnostic (for any valve tuning): the "smoother" the resulting patterns, the more facile the resulting slide manipulation. Note how the "curves" formed by these M2 increments throughout the bass clef closely mimic those throughout and below the treble clef an octave higher—and the m2-increment "curves" an octave above that.] [I just realised that I missed a few in the bass clef at the end of the slide—sorry about that!]


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[Cotboneman]

As I understand it, Mark worked closely with Holton to produce the TR-650 Collegiate model, tuned Bb/G, with a full-length slide (i.e. 7 positions in Bb, 6 in G). He wrote an article for the Musical Journal about the idea of "A Slide Trombone for Short Arms", published in March, 1966. In the accompanying (unfortunately overly dark) picture (where you can just make out the respective bells and the two slide bows), Mark is shown playing a note in slide-alone 7th position, while the young Philip Azzolina is playing the same note in G-attachment 4th position (which lies between slide-alone 4th and 5th). [Clearly, the instrument could have been built with a shorter (and thereby a better balanced) slide.]

I wonder if Philip kept up his interest in the trombone as he grew up—and whether he retained the minor-third attachment.

[I apologise for drifting away from the beautiful Bolero. I can (perhaps) justify this, because my Bolero, customised in 1960, also had a minor-third attachment and a full-length slide—just like the Holton TR-650 (which I was totally unaware of at the time).]

Just in case anyone is wondering exactly where the relative slide positions are, I've added in the ETSP Chart for the Bb/G tenor, with a full-length slide (McDunn's Holton or my Bolero): note the alternate positions for E2 and B2. [The dashed lines show major-second increments between adjacent harmonics—a good diagnostic (for any valve tuning): the "smoother" the resulting patterns, the more facile the resulting slide manipulation. Note how the "curves" formed by these M2 increments throughout the bass clef closely mimic those throughout and below the treble clef an octave higher—and the m2-increment "curves" an octave above that.] [I just realised that I missed a few in the bass clef at the end of the slide—sorry about that!]


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Thank you for this information!

[pbone3b]

I have one on consignment @ Josh Landress Brass in NYC
https://www.jlandressbrass.com/shop/Tro ... 268084.htm
I liked it, especially the ergonomics with its slightly wider slide, but ultimately, I have too many .508s

SOLD

[Posaunus]

As the OP, I should close the loop on this thread.
I was asking about Boleros on behalf of a friend who is seeking a new "lead trombone."
I have now been able to try a Bolero (only one) for a few days; it was O.K. Others may of course be better.
In the meantime, I stumbled across a "closet queen" 1979 King 3B that, after a minor service from an excellent tech, plays circles around the Bolero.
I guess I'm a "King guy!"

[Finetales]

I once tried a couple nice Boleros at DJ's alongside several 3Bs, both yellow and SS. I walked out with a 3B.

[slidesix]

That King 3B is not a bad choice. I have and use a King 2B myself. I really like it for that role.