Alto trombone, E-flat
Maker
Johann Christoph Fiebig
Date1771
Place MadeBerngrundt, Saxony, Germany, Europe
Serial No.none
SignedStamped on bell garland: IO HANN CHRISTOPH / FIEBIG MACHTS IN / BERNGRUNDT * 1771 * (letters are of different sizes, at odd angles, and of varying spacing. The letter "N" in the maker's first name and the town are backwards).MarkingsWorshop mark: Heraldic double fleur-de-lis (stamped 4 times underneath the signature)
On slide brace: IV V
On parallel body brace: V V
DescriptionBrass in two parts (slide section and bell section); bell with butt seam and solder bridges (short solder strips that are placed perpendicular to the seam); the same soldering method is found at the tubing; garland with straight upper edge, two engraved lines and rich tendril engravings; Saxon rim with twisted iron wire insert; tubular slide stays, movable stay telescopic; bell stay hammered more or less square from a tubular stay, soldered on neck-pipe side, hinged on bell-pipe side and attached with a pin; ferrules with engraved double rings and a few triple rings; undecorated saddle with broad ring at the bell bow and the slide bow.
The soldering method found in this trombone is highly unusual and the same as that found in a trumpet by Fiebig in Leipzig (no. 1803). Stylistic features, such as the twisted bell rim wire and the broad rings at the saddles are related to the Dresden style of J. Werner. Fiebig was a miller, working only 25 kilometers south of Dresden, making trumpets and trombones as a sideline.
DimensionsTube length: 2002 mm
Slide length: 428 mm and 430 mm
Initial diameter receiver: 11.1 mm
Internal diameter inner slides: 9.6 mm
Bell diameter: 102 mm
Overall length: 875 mm
ProvenancePurchased in 1996 from Boguslaw Wojar, Bühlertal, Germany.
Published ReferencesCurt Sachs, Sammlung alter Musikinstrumente (Berlin: 1922), p. 230.
Herbert Heyde, Trompeten, Pasaunen, Tuben, Leipzig Katalog Band 3 (Leipzig: 1980)
André P. Larson, “Unique Alto Trombone from 18th-Century Saxony,” America’s Shrine to Music Museum Newsletter 25, No. 2 (February 1998), p. 8.
Stewart Carter, "Early Trombones in America's Shrine to Music Museum," Historic Brass Society Journal 10 (1998), pp. 98-99.
Credit LineBoard of Trustees, 1996
Object number05946
On View
On view
1973 ca.
1973 ca.