{oh, I'm in 2)}

I'm in more than one camp.

The first horn I ever owned was a Bundy trombone. Didn't make it out of high school (that would be a 3)

I still have my Conn 4H trombone and 60B trumpet from high school. The 4H's tubes are shot; not worth much to anyone, so I just hang onto it (that would be a 2) The 60B is being saved for a couple more years to see just how serious one of my nephews gets about playing trumpet (that doesn't fit any of the available scenarios).

I also still have the bass trombone I played in college. The stockings are pretty worn and I eventually bought another horn of the same model with a better slide, but I still use old faithful for some things (like alumni band). I'd call that one a 1.5.

3 and 4. I started my trumpet playing as a university student in a jazz orchestra at the university. I was a beginner, the others not. When I left the orchestra six years later I left the horn (Yamaha 1130) I had bought too, for other beginners that may be interested in picking up the trumpet. That was a good home, but the orchestra doesn't exist anymore, so I sometimes wish it back. I guess it is buried in some cellar at the university now.

About the last thing I did to it was stripping the laqcuer and it played much worse, really bad. So I painted it green and it played well again...

Oh my, 
1 and 3 to say the least. I started playing trombone on the Huettl school trombone. It is still in use in my old school, recently I had the opportunity to play it again after 35 years... not the best sound... My first own trombone was a Reynolds (nice), after that a Bach 50B3L(good sound, poor build quality and NO ergonomics), the next was a Courtois 151R, which I still own and play since 1983. In 1992 I started playing tuba, since then on a Besson 981 Eb. This model was the first tuba I ever tried lot of years earlier... After some years trombone playing I got a baritone, three valved chinese toy, this has gone as gift to africa, now I have four french saxhorns... Actually I am waiting for delivery of my newest horn, the dream of my childhood: a small french tuba by Courtois (yes, this tiny thing in C, six valve buttons poking out of a clump of brass tubing). They are pretty hard to find! (Kenton: I will send you pictures of all the horns!)
But for that buy my Courtois trombone from the 30s, which I owned for 25 years had to go...
Musicalement, Helmut

What about instead of only........

1) I still have it, I still play it, It is my one and only.

there was another choice :

I still have it. I still play it some times.  It is still a keeper when I think about some of the places I've played it years ago, even though I have added others to the collection since.

I still have my valve set of my C,  the other parts have been replaced.

#2) My grandfather caught me "mucking about" with his York Professional cornet and tanned my hide,( age 8 ). He then decided to take me to all of the musical instrument stores in Grand Rapids in search of a horn that was to be exclusively mine. At Hager Music he found a Buckingham cornet of American style that suited him and that I then played until my juniour year in high school. I then inherited my dads King Silvertone trumpet. The Silvertone was stolen from the closet of my room in the B.O.Q. at San Diego Naval Hospital. I still have the Buckingham cornet, which is now in storage, here at home.



OLDLOU>>