Long Island Brass - the 550E and Romero review

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WilliamLang
Posts: 636
Joined: Nov 22, 2019

by WilliamLang »

Hi all!

I was able to go visit Long Island Brass the other day and was completely blown away by one of their options, the 550E mouthpiece. I've been happily using a fantastic Doug Elliott piece for the last few months, which does a lot of wonderful and unique things, and which I will also never get rid of, especially as a chamber/quintet/show option, but the 550E fits my sound concept just a touch better. I really feel spoiled for options!

For this video I compared the 550E (w/ a T1 shank) alongside a 1st generation LI Brass Sasha Romero (.285 backbore and T3 shank,) a Laskey-Alessi 60SYMPH, and Doug's fantastically made XT 104 rim XT G* cup and G8 shank combo.

<YOUTUBE id="vTk4zTPvnlU">https://youtu.be/vTk4zTPvnlU</YOUTUBE>
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Bach5G
Posts: 2874
Joined: Apr 07, 2018

by Bach5G »

Thanks, very cool.

The ā€œEā€ designation: euphonium?
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norbie2018
Posts: 1051
Joined: Apr 05, 2018

by norbie2018 »

It's not listed on their website. Can you discuss the specs of the 550e?
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WilliamLang
Posts: 636
Joined: Nov 22, 2019

by WilliamLang » (edited 2023-08-11 8:24 p.m.)

Sure! It has a slightly different outer shape than the Romero line, with a little more mass overall. The biggest difference is in the inner slope - it's a little more hallowed out in the inner walls, which leads to a larger empty volumetric area.

Apparently this mouthpiece felt great to a lot of euphonium players, and basically no other trombonists. I've always had an affinity for very deep cups though, maybe because I came up with a Shilke 51D through most of high school.
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norbie2018
Posts: 1051
Joined: Apr 05, 2018

by norbie2018 »

<EMOJI seq="1f60a" tseq="1f60a">😊</EMOJI>
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LIBrassCo
Posts: 585
Joined: Feb 24, 2019

by LIBrassCo »

[quote="norbie2018"]It's not listed on their website. Can you discuss the specs of the 550e?[/quote]

That's on me, have to get the photos done. It's a 25.5mm rim, .280" throat, and a larger cup (between a 2 and 3g depth).
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harrisonreed
Posts: 6479
Joined: Aug 17, 2018

by harrisonreed »

That's pretty darn deep for tenor
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LIBrassCo
Posts: 585
Joined: Feb 24, 2019

by LIBrassCo »

[quote="harrisonreed"]That's pretty darn deep for tenor[/quote]

Agreed. It's actually for Euph, but it worked great for Will on tenor.
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harrisonreed
Posts: 6479
Joined: Aug 17, 2018

by harrisonreed »

Yep. He's a beast! I've wondered, what is the notch on the shank for?
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Posaunus
Posts: 5018
Joined: Mar 23, 2018

by Posaunus »

Will Lang is right - the 550E mouthpiece suits him perfectly. He sounds better than ever on it.

Given its specs, I don't think I could ever get it to work well for me. (Too deep.) To each his own!
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LIBrassCo
Posts: 585
Joined: Feb 24, 2019

by LIBrassCo »

[quote="harrisonreed"]Yep. He's a beast! I've wondered, what is the notch on the shank for?[/quote]

Sizing. 1 ring = T1 shank.