Restoration Update

After a thorough examination of my old Getzen Eterna Severinsen Large Bore Model trumpet, Charlie Melk, of Charlie's Brass Works in Georgia, provided me with two options: partial restoration with spot-plating as necessary, or complete restoration and re-plating. Both options were about what I expected for a job of this nature. Charlie said the horn was in good shape for its age and it only had plating wear in a few places. All of the rest of the work was going to be pretty ordinary repair work with the exception of the leadpipe since those of that era have not been made in a long time, and current Getzen replacement leadpipes are simply not the same. He mentioned mine was probably one of the last of that particular style, as well, even though the Severinsen Model was manufactured quite a few more years after mine.

Given all of this information, it really boiled down to going the extra mile to have it look like a new trumpet with a complete re-plating job or just clean it thoroughly and give it a nice polishing. In either case, the leadpipe required replacement given the red rot situation. I decided that since it was no longer going to be "all-original" that I would just go the partial restoration route and not double the cost of the job.

A few days later, Charlie called to say she was ready. He found a good match for the leadpipe although, as I suspected would be the case, it was not a Getzen/Allied-made replacement. Personally, I do not care as long as the best playing pipe was selected, and he said this one was head and shoulders better than the rest. Charlie spent about ten or fifteen minutes on the phone with me running though his thoughts. I paid my bill and he said she'd be going out that evening. Based on the shipping info, she's arriving tomorrow; that is some fast turnaround. I will post more once she arrives.

On other fronts... I've gotten my S13A VR Vs (replacing a S14A VR Vs) from K.O. at Stomvi USA. Since I am working towards more efficiency in my playing, I decided that a reduction in size was in order. So far so good with it, and I'll talk more about it in the future.

I also received a JT MF MASTER I ordered from Derek at Legends Brass. I wanted another convex V cup to go along with my experimentation with Lynn Nicholson's XPiece, Reversible Rim, and his "MF Protocol". I have not had a lot of time to test it, but like the S13A, so far so good.

I'm really looking forward to tomorrow!